How to travel Canada on a budget
Traveling Canada on a budget can be hard to do. It’s one of the more expensive countries you will come across, but don’t let that put you off. There are plenty of tricks and tips that will help you keep the cost as low as possible while still being able to enjoy everything the country has to offer.
This is our guide to traveling Canada on a low budget. We will tell you exactly what we spent on our 3 month road trip as well as give you our tips on how you can keep the costs down to a minimum.
Transport
Buying the van and maintenance costs
There is no way around it. If you want to spend a decent amount of time exploring Canada and be able to head off away from the beaten track then having your own wheels is an absolute must. Trains are relatively expensive, domestic flights are most definitely expensive and buses are only going to take you so far. Trust me when you reach somewhere like the Rockies and the Icefields Parkway the last thing you want is to spend 20 minutes enjoying each place before your ushered back on to your overpriced tour bus along with the masses. Get yourself a van, a car that you can throw a sleeping bag in the back, get anything that moves and will take you where you want to go! Just get your own wheels. You won’t regret it and neither will your wallet.
For our van we were very fortunate to be put in touch with a guy named Jim in Vancouver after speaking with Lotte over at https://www.phenomenalglobe.com/. Jim owns a few small GMC Safari vans that he maintains and sells to travelers like ourselves. He knows these vans inside out and makes sure they are safe and as reliable as possible. If you are thinking of buying a van in Vancouver then drop us a line and we will put you in touch with him. We paid Jim $4,500 for our van “Buddy”.
Now you can pick up an old GMC Safari just like ours for much less. Maybe $1,500-$2,000. But the question you have to ask is how reliable the van is at that price? If your traveling for several months, covering thousands of kilometers, how much are you going to have to fork out for repairs to keep your trip going? Thankfully with Jim being an expert when it comes to these vans Buddy didn’t let us down once. We had no maintenance costs at all. During our 3 month trip all we had to shell out for was oil changes every 5,000 Km at 50 bucks a piece. We covered 12,700Km so $100 was our total cost for maintenance.
Also compared to buying a cheaper van from say craigslist or some other site we didn’t have to worry about selling the van at short notice when it came time to leave Canada. Jim had already agreed with us that he would buy the van back at the end. This gave us peace of mind that we would have no issues trying to get money back from our investment. It also meant that we wouldn’t be desperate and have to sell the van at a cut price due to time restraints come the end of our adventure.
We spent a total of 85 days in Buddy during our time in Canada. Jim bought the van back from us for $3,000 giving us a total cost for the van and maintenance of $1,600. That breaks down to $17.64 a day. Bear in mind that this cost also covered the majority of our accommodation as well as the ability to go anywhere we wanted, whenever we wanted.
Insurance
Insurance was a bit of a nightmare. In British Columbia where we bought the van there is only 1 insurer available ICBC. It is a government owned insurer so there is no hassle of having to shop around comparing quotes which is great. The downside for us is that I haven’t owned a car in the UK for several years now. Despite having a letter from my most recent insurer back home to show that I had no-claims for a number of years, it wasn’t accepted by the insurance company as it wasn’t within the last 3 years. I was charged as if I was a brand new driver who had never had a policy before which obviously meant my premium was high. If you have any no-claims built up at home then give your insurer a call and ask them to send you some confirmation. From speaking with ICBC they advised you would receive up to 40% discount on your policy. We paid up front for 5 months insurance not knowing how long our trip would last and were refunded the difference at the end when our policy was cancelled down. In total our insurance for 3 months cost us $1,300. $15.29 a day.
Fuel
Petrol (or gas as you will get used to calling it) is cheap in Canada. It’s roughly half the cost of the UK. But do be mindful that it can vary quite dramatically depending on which province you are in. We traveled mainly throughout British Columbia but when we did dip in to Alberta we discovered that Alberta is about 30% cheaper.
Despite the fact that petrol is cheaper, the engine size here is much bigger than in Europe. Our little van was powered by a gas guzzling 4.3 litre engine so it sort of cancels out the savings you make on petrol being cheaper. On average we got about 100Km for every $10 we put in. We covered a total of 12,700 Km so that’s $1,270 we spent for fuel, $14.94 a day.
Breakdown cover
10 bucks a month got us our breakdown cover. Not that we needed to use it but I highly recommend you take it. Canada is vast and if your hundreds of kilometers from the nearest mechanic it could cost you a fortune to get a tow truck out to come and ferry you to the nearest place that can get you moving again. As with our vehicle registration and insurance we bought our breakdown cover through ICBC. You have to go to a different office but it’s the same government owned company. Unfortunately they don’t let you cancel down the policy early so you end up having to pay for a full year no matter how long you may need the cover. Total cost for that cover was $120.
So doing the basic math. It was $1,500 for the van $1,300 for the insurance, $1,270 for fuel and $120 for breakdown cover. Throw in our two oil changes at $100 and we spent a total of $4,290.
That works out at a daily spend of $50.74 for our 85 days. Converting it into Pounds that was £31.05. This cost covered our transport and also our accommodation for each day. Not too bad when you think of it that way and given just how many miles we covered.
That’s transport and the bulk of our accommodation covered. Lets take a look at what we spent on food.
Total=$4,290
Food
Food wasn’t as cheap as we expected and it took a little while for us to settle in and work out the cheapest way to do it.
There are two main supermarket chains in British Columbia. Walmart and Save-on-Foods and then several smaller “Dollar stores” that you will also find in most towns. We used all of these after working out which ones offered the best value for which products.
Walmart have some of the better deals on meat. Unfortunately being in North America all of the supermarket chains assume you have some sort of industrial sized freezer at home….or an industrial sized family! Meat is generally packed in huge portions. $20 worth of chicken at a time, $15 dollars worth of mince etc. Living out of a van in the scorching summer heat with only an ice box meant buying these packs wasn’t cost effective. We tried it once and everything was spoiled after 2 days. Occasionally you do get a smaller sized portion, but these are few and far between. So, being on a budget we didn’t eat a lot of the usual meat that we would at home. Instead when we had meat it was mostly sausages. You can pick up a pack of 6 sausages for $5. We generally lived off 1 sausage each per meal when we had them.Walmart is also the winner when it comes to your basics such as milk, eggs and bread so we bought those there.
Save-on-foods at times was a life saver when it came to keeping the cost down. Walmart don’t ever reduce goods that are going out of date. They give it to food-banks for the homeless which is certainly a good thing. Not such a good thing for budget travelers though. Save-on-foods however do reduce produce and these were the times when we treat ourselves to other meats such as pork and beef. It really is hit or miss though. You just have to hope they have something reduced at the day and time you go.
Another great tip when shopping at Save-on-Foods is to get a ‘More’ card. These little blue cards can get you discounts on certain groceries that they have special deals on. You need the More card else you pay full price and don’t get the discount. These deals are clearly advertised in the store. You also accrue points on the card every time you shop there. These points are redeemable against your bill or can be used for special offers that are only available with points. Ask for a card. It doesn’t matter if your from Canada or not, they will gladly hand one over to you and we found it really handy to use.
“dollar stores” are great when it comes to tinned food and dried goods such as rice, pasta and condiments. We stocked up on at least 20 tins of ready to eat pasta every time we came across one. Tins of soup were also a good and cheap staple meal. These tins sell for roughly 80 cents. We always kept a good supply of rice, pasta and noodles as well. These combined with the cheap condiments and sausages or reduced meat we bought made up at least half of our meals. Dollar stores were also much cheaper for things such as soft drinks or snacks.
Most days we lived off 2 meals a day. Usually a tin of pasta for breakfast. Which was great especially if it was raining as there is no prep involved. Open said can. Empty contents into pan. Heat on stove and eat. Simple.
Our evening meal was when we combined all the other ingredients we had into some sort of concoction. Sausage pasta. Sausage risotto. Sausage and noodles. You get the idea.
On days when we were out hiking and needed more energy we would usually make some sandwiches to take with us. Normally consisting of some kind of canned meat or tuna from a dollar store, some sliced gherkins and a splash of mustard to jazz it up a bit. Pretty simple stuff really.
That said Dani did rustle up some amazing meals from very little. As long as you spend a few dollars on decent condiments, dried herbs and spices it is amazing what you can come up with for relatively little outlay.
Including coffee, skimmed milk and all the other bits and bobs we spent a total of $622 dollars on food between us over the 85 days. Averaging out at $7.32 a day. That’s pretty decent for somewhere like Canada.
Total=£622
Other costs
There are various other costs that took our total spend for the trip higher.
Vancouver
When we first arrived Buddy wasn’t ready to collect. We spent 4 nights in the cheapest Airbnb we could find at $45 a night. With hindsight we shouldn’t have just gone for the cheapest we could find. We stayed in the Surrey area of Vancouver which is quite some distance from the centre. We needed skytrain tickets each day to get into the centre and back to check out the sights and this set us back an additional $18 a day between us.
Vancouver itself is ridiculously expensive. We ended up eating at the likes of Subway and cheap chain type take-away that they have dotted about the town and in the Skytrain stations as these were the cheapest options. If you want a bite to eat in a deli or restaurant it will set you back at least $12 each for the pleasure. The one saving grace of this was a place called Bon’s off Broadway. They do awesome all-day breakfasts for just $2.95 each including unlimited coffee (this was a personal life saver!) If your ever in Vancouver you need to get yourself along to Bon’s. You won’t be disappointed.
So before we even had Buddy and were able to head off and sleep in him we had already spent $368 just from hanging around Vancouver for a few days.
If there is one single piece of advice about keeping your spending down, it is to keep out of the cities as much as possible. Particularly Vancouver, it will bleed you dry.
Kitting out the Van
We also had additional costs for various bits of camping gear that we needed. Some camping chairs, pots and pans, cutlery. Some nice little lights to make the van feel more homely. Some comfy cushions to make our nights more cosy. All these little things add up but there is a great way to do it cheaply!
Walmart in Canada gives you a 90 day money back guarantee. When we first headed off in the van we bought everything we thought we would need in a few hours at Walmart and made sure we kept the receipt. Then as the days progressed and we passed through towns we started Thrift shopping. Thrift shops in Canada are brilliant. Some of them are huge and have pretty much anything you could need for very cheap prices. $4.99 for a tin opener in Walmart? 50¢ at the thrift shop. $19.99 for a throw or quilt in Walmart….$4.00 at the thrift shop. All the things we picked up at the thrift shops were so much nicer and more quirky than anything you get at boring old Walmart.
So get everything you need as soon as you can. Keep your receipt. Pick up cheaper things along the way. Return to Walmart for your refund. We did this so many times and it must have saved us a good $200 I reckon by having a mosey through the thrift stores. Check them out. The thrift stores are great places anyway to get chatting to some locals and finding out more about the area your in. I miss thrift stores!
I would say everything to kit the van out cost us about $50. Again, I don’t think that’s too bad at all.
Mountain bikes
We couldn’t travel Canada and not have mountain bikes to go and throw ourselves down some hills on. They have some of the best trails known to man and it would have been sacrilege if we didn’t. We spent $200 on a couple of second hand bikes and $50 on a rack to fix them to the van. We found the bikes via the Canadian classified website https://www.kijiji.ca/. It’s a great site for finding a lot of different things you might want for your trip locally and at short notice. We also checked Facebook marketplace as well which is where we found the bike rack while in Kelowna. Our one regret is that we didn’t take the plunge earlier and spend that little bit more to get the bikes when we started.
Jim was very kind and gave us back more than he originally agreed to give us for the van. We didn’t have any time at the end to sell the bikes or rack so he took them from us and kindly gave us the money for them. I didn’t mention that earlier as I want to give a true reflection of the cost for the van. I’ll leave this out of the total as it cancelled itself out. In essence we made our money back on the bikes so there was no cost at all for them.
Other accommodation
We stayed at paid for camp sites for 9 nights. Sometimes you have to when you desperately need a shower and a clean up. You can also ask at these sites if you can just pay for a shower and not stay there. We ran into a few that only charged us a couple of bucks each for a nice hot shower.
There are also another couple of ways you can keep this cost down as well. There are a chain of Gas stations across the country called Husky. Try and get your fuel there when you pass one. Get a Husky rewards card and start saving up some points. Every so often you will spot a Husky that has a big Canadian flag hanging outside and these are the bigger truck-stop stations. Here you can spend the points you’ve saved on a shower.
Also many small towns have community sports centers or swimming baths. Most of them will let you pop in for a shower for just a couple of dollars. They are great places and again all the staff at these places were most helpful, friendly and took an interest in what we were doing. We spent about $16 on using these facilities.
We also stayed at a provincial camp ground in Jasper National Park. It was too far to drive in and out of the Park every day and we would have spent just as much on gas just for the sake of a “free” spot as we did for the camp ground. We spent about $115 on paid for camp grounds in total.
We also had one nights accommodation at the cheapest hotel we could find in Calgary. We had drove into Calgary to pick up a mountain bike and it took forever. There were no free spots around that area at all so we had one nights relax in a real bed to give us a break. That set us back $70.
Meals out
Meals out. We only went for one real restaurant meal the whole time we were there. A beautiful seafood dinner at “Dolly’s fish market” in Prince Rupert. A little pricey at $40 between us but worth every penny. Beautiful light batter, scallops, prawns…..I could eat it all again, right now. Pop in if your passing through!
If your budget isn’t as tight as ours there are a myriad of amazing looking places to eat in Canada. Going our for meals appears to big business in Canada and it certainly looked to us that the ‘foodies’ are very well catered for. Like alcohol this really comes down to your own budget and what you want to do during your trip. We wish we could have ate out a lot more as some of the food we saw looked amazing. That said there was something nice about parking up, getting the old camping stove out and crafting our meals from scratch. It’s your choice.
Passes and entry fees
The National Park pass. You need one of these 100%. If your spending any length of time in Canada and don’t visit any of the National parks then you’ve missed a treat. it is some of the most spectacular scenery you will see anywhere in world. Full stop. You don’t need one to enter or drive through the parks but if your going to use any of the car parks near the various sites then you need this pass. They enforce this strictly so make sure you get one. It cost us $137 and again, worth every penny.
Your pass covers every National Park in Canada for a year. You are supposed to fill out your details on the back and they are non-transferable. Come the end of the trip you have a good chance of selling it on to other travelers just starting out.
When it comes to the National Parks you have two options for accommodation. Either pay to use one of the camp grounds or accommodation within the park (there are no free spots anywhere and again this is strictly enforced) Or you can do what we did for most of the our time there and located free spots just outside the Park boundary. It will save you a fortune and you find some amazing little gems of wild camp spots. Traveling Canada on a budget
The only other entrance fees we paid for was at the Tumbler Ridge Dinosaur museum. $16 between us. We passed loads of other museums and exhibitions that we could have paid to go and see but we chose not to. Don’t get me wrong some of them looked really good and maybe worth the money but we wanted to keep our spending low. That combined with the fact that there is so much to see and experience everywhere you go in Canada made it feel as if we didn’t need to spend any more than we did to enjoy ourselves and have a great adventure. Traveling Canada on a budget
When it comes to finding free spots to park up at we highly recommend the iOverlander app for smartphones. It’s brilliant. You can add spots you find along the way on the app for others to then use. Over time this process has built up and there are now literally thousands of free and wild camp spots logged on the maps for you to use. It’s an invaluable tool when traveling in your own transport. It’s found us digs for the night at short notice, in the middle of nowhere when we are both absolutely knackered and need to pull over. Traveling Canada on a budget
Tim Horton’s and McDonald’s
Some mornings we would grab a coffee between us at either Tim Horton’s (Canada’s version of Greggs) or McDonald’s. My preference is Tim’s, better coffee and much more chilled than the big yellow M. Traveling Canada on a budget
Living out of a tiny van meant we couldn’t charge all of our gadgets from the cigarette lighter alone. Things like my DSLR and Laptop need a bit more juice to charge them up so we would grab a cuppa, charge up and catch some free Wi-Fi for a couple of hours. We spent about $50 in total on this. Make sure you get a Tim’s rewards card. You get a free coffee for every 7 you purchase. Likewise with McDonald’s. Keep your coffee stickers, fill up your card, grab a free brew!
Vancouver at the end
After selling Buddy back to Jim we had one more night that we needed somewhere to stay and this time opted for an Airbnb closer to the airport. It set us back $55 Traveling Canada on a budget Traveling Canada on a budget
Total=$901
This gives us a grand total of $5,813/£3,450 for our 3 month road trip round Canada
We spent a total of 90 days in Canada, so for two people it breaks down to $64.58 a day for everything or £39.18 of good old pounds sterling.
I think that’s really decent for a country that certainly isn’t cheap. it shows you just how cheap you can do it for if you are clever and budget well. All the little savings add up. Traveling Canada on a budget Traveling Canada on a budget
Now, the bits we didn’t tell you…………
Okay. So everyone who knows us knows that we both love a good beer and are addicted to the devil smokes. I didn’t include it in the above breakdown as I wanted to show what we spent on the real basics of our trip. For those looking to plan their own trip it illustrates how you can have a great adventure in Canada on a relatively small budget.
Drinking and smoking are personal luxuries that not everybody indulges in and I’m not going to go in to how much we spent ourselves (it was loads!) Instead I’ll give you a quick rundown of how much to expect to pay for drink and cigarettes.
Cigarettes aren’t cheap in Canada. Slightly cheaper than the UK at around $12 (£7.30) a pack. But when you have traveled places like Asia where they are ridiculously cheap this can have a huge impact on your budget.
Beer is slightly cheaper than the UK depending on how much digging around you do at the at the liquor stores. You can’t buy alcohol in supermarkets or corner shops like you can in many countries. It has to be from a liquor store, where all they sell is liquor and sometimes cigarettes. 99% of these stores are province/government stores and I have to say that most of them have a fantastic selection. Most stock a good selection of beers from local breweries as well as staple popular brands that appear in every store.
The beers in Canada are among the best we’ve ever had. If you love IPA’s, craft ales, unique ruby’s and stellar stouts then you will love the beer they have to offer in Canada. It’s superb. To us there was nothing better than parking up for sunset at the end of the day. Beautiful lake and scenery all laid out in front of you. Camp fire roaring and a nice fruity IPA to wash it all down with. Amazing nights were had. Traveling Canada on a budget Traveling Canada on a budget
Quite often we would get the 12 can mixed cases such as “Hop Box” or the “Red Racer” range for around $25 a case. That’s pretty decent really. About £1.25 a can for a really good quality beer. Some of them quite often strong ales as well, pushing 8-9%. Other ales in the stores are really expensive. If you want to splash out they have some amazing sounding brews. We would have loved to try more of these but limited ourselves to just a few or we would be on a plane heading back home now, broke as jokes. Traveling Canada on a budget
Spirits are pretty much on an even keel with the UK. $26/£16 gets you a bottle of Jim Beam or something like Captain Morgans, Bacardi or a basic Vodka. I dread to think how many liters of Bourbon we got through but it was quite a few. No many, it was definitely many bottles. They also quite often have specials on the spirits and we got to sample some of the stronger bourbons for the same price. Traveling Canada on a budget
Wine seemed quite pricey and mainly available around the Okanagon wine region. Your looking at $15 upwards for a bottle. We did grab an occasional box now and then when we found them on special offer. 4 litres for $35 seemed like a decent deal at the time. Traveling Canada on a budget
It’s always up to every individual how they travel and what their budget is, the choice is yours.
I hope you’ve found this guide useful. If you have any questions just drop us a line in the comments box below and we will be happy to answer any questions. Traveling Canada on a budget
You can find all of our Canada diaries here.
