JULY COST OF LIVING AND BEARD UPDATE

Hey y’all, we’ve completed two months of full time travel, and our third month of being “homeless”. Hooray for us! I gave you a breakdown of our June expenses in a previous post that you can read here if you missed it. I am including some random pictures we took during the month of July that were not previously shared, and pictures of growing beards.

GAS – $222

Since we arrived in Alaska, we have slowed down our driving from campground to campground. Instead, we are spending more time in one place in order to see all the sights and get to know each area. Therefore, it is only logical that gas was the smallest of our expenses. We spent $222 in July compared to $1,170 in June.

CAMPGROUNDS – $1,252

Usually you can get a small discount for staying a week in a campground, but it did not decrease our expense in July. Due to the fact that Anchorage only has two to three decent campgrounds, they can command a high nightly rate. We paid $49 a night for two weeks in Anchorage during their busiest time of year. June had one less day in the month and we only spent $1,097, about $150 less than July.

DINING – $788

Not surprising, but we spent $60 more than the previous month on eating out. We are still eating one meal out per day and I have only cooked one dinner in our crockpot. A couple days we ate sandwiches, but most of the time we spend around $30 at a restaurant. Lately, we have been taking turns picking out a place to eat. Dad likes to find DDD endorsed establishments from Guy Fieri’s show.

ENTERTAINMENT – $3,034

This category was by far our largest expense. Our three day trip to Kodiak Island was a big contributor. A lot of our cash goes to boat tours, dog sledding, musicals, and all other attractions that have entrance fees. We also try to do a lot of free things along the way as we find them.

MISCELLANEOUS – $410

Shopping for necessities and a small amount of groceries make up the majority of this total amount. The truck needed an oil change which took $160 and we know there is a malfunctioning sensor, but we didn’t have faith in the Ford dealer in Anchorage to perform the job.  Fingers crossed that we don’t have any problems with it before we get to the lower 48.

Just like last month, we did not track our fixed costs such as insurance, cell phones, truck or RV purchase prices, or storage of our belongings back home. That being said, the grand total for July was $5,706.

Only two months into the trip and the guys look like this:

In case you forgot the original picture after a couple of days:

I’ve already heard someone make a reference to Grizzly Adams. I’ll keep you updated on the beards after the end of August. We are heading out for another three day trip to the most northern city in the US. Stay tuned for what we might find there!