Food

• Eating 2 substantial meals a day instead of 3 – one at midmorning and one in the late afternoon – keeps both the weight and the budget down.
• Dining out can quickly eat into your budget.  Scoping out local markets where they serve food or finding restaurants that cater to the local population can greatly reduce the amount you must spend each day. Eat where the locals eat, and don’t be afraid to try street food.
• Discussing our next day’s spending the night before helps keep us in check and helps us avoid crazy spending. We decide based on our planned activity level when/where we’ll be eating. A low-activity day usually just means a big breakfast and mid-afternoon meal, while a full activity day means 3 squares and probably an ice cream cone.
• Snacks are good – When heading to a remote location, bring some snacks with you.  When you get there you will be beholden to whatever price they may decide to charge.
• Buy alcohol in grocery stores when possible – alcohol can quickly blow your daily budget, especially at bar prices.  For our cruise to Antarctica we carried 6 bottles with us onto the ship and saved over $75. We did buy wine on the ship, but it was nice to save a bit of money.  Of course we could have just not had any wine, but what that would just be silly.
• Buy groceries more frequently – while in Lima, Peru we shopped almost daily in local shops and grocery stores.  By shopping frequently we only bought what we needed ensuring we did not waste any left over food.  Plus, since we only walked to shop we got great exercise…especially with all the wine.
• DO NOT eat in restaurants with English menus as much as possible. [thanks to Jenni and Lisa at Out & Around]