Summer (or near summer for us) equals vacation time. But for most, a relaxing vacation week can have you nervously scrutinizing your bank account the next week. What fun is that? To help minimize that impact, I’m sharing how to save on your meals during vacation.
I love vacations, I’m sure you do too. It’s fun to get away and explore new locations, but after paying for transportation, hotels, and restaurants, our bank accounts usually end up hating the vacation! And if you have kids it adds to the total, and before you know it the vacation becomes a burden.
Vacation Options Besides Hotels
Luckily, there are ways to reduce costs and still get away. You can camp, own a timeshare or use an Airbnb or other rental option. (Camping Hint: Want to camp, but don’t have a camper or tent? Check out the KOA website. Almost any location you wish to go to includes some type of rental in the form of cabins or yurts.) The key to all of these options is that you have the ability to make your own meals and the savings you get by cooking your own meals can really help to reduce the overall cost of a vacation.
Keep A Kitchen Box
The key to saving money while staying in a rental is to have a box designated for kitchen and bathroom essentials. Usually, rentals include dishes and utensils, but it’s best to always call ahead to find out what will be stocked. The timeshare that we use also includes dishwashing soap, garbage bags, and paper towels. But there are many things that aren’t included in the kitchen, and that’s why we pack a kitchen box. For instance, we pack salt and pepper and other spices, rice, dried cereal, tea bags, coffee, and condiments. These are the non-perishables you shouldn’t waste money on by waiting to buy when you to your destination. You can’t count on them being as cheap as you might find at home, especially if you’re in a remote location. (Trust me on this one, we learned our lesson the first time we used our timeshare. Not only was it a waste of money, but it was a waste of time.) Now, once we get there all we have to worry about is buying the perishable items like fruit, veggies, and meat. Below are some of the items that we use.
Stack & Pull Box, 32 Quart
We love the clear boxes which makes it easy to see what’s in each one. We usually take two separate boxes, one for dry goods and the other for liquids like oils that we cook with, liquid laundry detergent, etc.
Multi-Grill Spice and Herb Assortment Shaker
This covers most of the spices you might need like salt, pepper, garlic, and curry. There are other spice packs available or you can bring your bigger spice bottles from home.
Domino Pure Cane NON-GMO Granulated Sugar
We like sugar in our coffee, but you don’t necessarily have to bring sugar at all. These are just some of the options that are available. You can find other things that work best for your family.
Packing List Printable
To make packing for our vacations easier, I created a printable that I’m sharing below. The checklist includes kitchen, bathroom and laundry staples along with extra space for things like electronics and chargers. We use it for each vacation to make sure that we bring everything that we need. We hope it makes your vacation packing easier too. Have fun on your vacation and don’t worry about the food bills.
Cottage Planning List
You can print out the Vacation Cottage Planning list from the link. Use it for all your future trips.
This is very useful, Jennifer. We make sure to carry a cutting knife and a can opener too when we stay at our time share resorts.
We lucked out with our time-share. Fully stocked with utensils, including scissors.
Great advice, I’m definitely with you on eating at the rental place and not eating three meals a day in restaurants. I don’t mind cooking and don’t treat it like a burden as some people do when on vacation. Send me off to the local supermarket or even better a fresh seafood market, and I’ll take it from there :).
I don’t mind the cooking either…..because my husband does it! LOL, he actually does it so quick and easy that it’s not worth the money or the hassle to go somewhere else.
Oooh this is good. We cook in, but that cleaning supply box is brilliant!
Excellent tips–thank you! I hate that feeling of having overspent when I get home from vacation and the credit card bill arrives…
I know. I used to dread the credit card bill, but that would add stress back on. I’d rather not go there, work adds enough stress.
If we do use hotels and breakfast is included. We make breakfast our main meal of the day, and lighter meals or snacks for the rest. Love visiting supermarkets when travelling! Love eating full stop 🙂
We love eating and will take advantage of a hotel’s “free” breakfast buffet. But wherever possible, we make sure we’re either in a timeshare or staying someplace that comes with a kitchen. I love visiting local supermarkets and local farm stands for our food.
Yes we very rarely do hotels and mainly use AirBnB. As we are now travelling fulltime mostly housesitting. Yes local farm stands and markets are fun to go to!
Jennifer, we now use AirBnB more than any other form of accommodation. We do try and fill most of our time travelling with housesits as that’s what we do now. Love farm stands and local markets!
House sitting might be something I need to look into in a few years.
Great tips here! We always buy stuff in for breakfast if we’re staying in an apartment, usually fruit, yogurts and oats so we don’t have that panic of running around trying to find a restaurant or cafe!
Makes mornings so much easier when you’re not running around, getting dressed and getting out the door to have breakfast. It’s vacation, so much better to slow down and enjoy things.
Food is always our biggest budget buster. I always pack a ton of food if we are doing a road trip, and can manage to make use of it for the first couple of days. Then the ‘ooh let’s just stop here’ stuff starts! That kills us, although we do love it and it’s part of the fun.
Sometimes towards the end, we might get a little caught up. But I have to say that this last vacation, food sucked everywhere unless Chris was making it. The one place that was good was a breakfast joint that we always go to when we’re in Myrtle Beach—the place the locals meet at.
What great tips! I visited a KOA in Ventura, California with some other bloggers and it was gorgeous. You could choose from fancy little houses to teepees and they have a pool and lots of activities. I generally hate camping but would love to stay there. Pinned.
Such good tips. We just rented a place on Cape Cod and, of course, had to shop for all the items you just mentioned. Wish I read this earlier!
You’ll have to keep the checklist for next year because I know you’re going back!