July ‘26 Slow Travel Budget
Welcome one and all to the first installment of the Slow Travel Monthly Budget Series! Should I make an acronym out of it? Hereafter known as STMBS? Sah-tumb-es?
Perhaps not.
What follows is the type of post I was searching for while thinking about and planning for our eventual slow travels. I always wanted to know what other people were spending, so that Ryan and I could start to estimate what living like this might cost.
So let’s get into it!
About to enjoy a wee tipple.
Why July Was an Outlier
July was a bit wonky budget-wise because we paid a few of our moving costs (U-Haul rental, etc) and leftover utility bills from our townhouse in Charlotte this month. We also did the most driving we will likely ever do in one month- not only to travel from Charlotte to my family in Tennessee, but then to complete the epic quest that was driving up here to Cape Breton.
For these reasons and more, I’m curious as to how July will stack up to August, September and so on- but overall we didn’t miss the mark too terribly on any of our budget categories.
How This Works
A few things on the data you see below:
The accommodations budget reflects what we spent this month, not how much our current accommodations cost. This month we booked and paid for our month-long stay for January 2027 in Pagosa Springs, CO and a two-day mini trip to visit the Louisbourg Fortress about three hours south of where we are now. The budget below reflects how much those two stays cost in total.
All numbers are in dollar amounts. I’ve begged Canva to let me put dollar signs in my data set for the pie chart, but so far they don’t allow it. Sad face.
The tiny grey sliver without a label at the top is our utilities and subscriptions budget, and it ran $215 in July.
“Health” includes insurance and any other medical expenses. Ryan’s health insurance is covered by his former employer.
Please be mesmerized by the pretty colors!
Surprises
So- the total spend for the month of July was $6702. Our budgeted goal for an average slow travel month was $7325, so we are a bit under that projection even though many of our categories were higher than expected!
One thing that shocked us was the amount we spent on discretionary items- this is more than we’ve spent in a long time but it felt like we must’ve blown it out of the water, in an over-spending type of way.
As I said to Ryan, “but it felt like we were ballin!” We’ve gone out to lunch after a long hike with nary a care! We took my niece and nephew out to a climbing gym and ice cream! We took ourselves to a fancy distillery with a beautiful babbling brook running through it and drank whisky and ate a delicious lunch!
It has felt SO FUN to feel grounded in the knowledge of a bigger discretionary budget and to feel freer to spend on super fun things. I’m so grateful for this.
I know Ramit would feel so proud that I’m just out here spending with joy and living my rich life. Thanks for that gold star validation I’m very much sure you’d give me, Ramit!
And as I accept my gold star up on that imaginary stage, there’s someone I have to thank- someone without whom none of this would’ve been possible: the current exchange rate.
Thank you, current exchange rate!
A Few Notes
Let’s be honest- this entire post is really only interesting to the financial nerds amongst us. If that’s you- buckle up because we are about to dive headfirst into a glittering pool of nerdiness!
There are several budget categories in particular that we look at when we complete our Conscious Spending Plan each month. If we haven’t spent the budgeted amount, the remainder gets transferred into its own savings bucket in Ally.
This is because these categories could (and likely will, at some point) include a large, one-time expense- and in retirement, I don’t want to get hit with a large bill without having savings for it.
These categories include medical expenses, Maya’s care, accommodations and gifts (mainly to have a buffer for Christmas spending).
Now- this is really a psychological play. If it were just up to Ryan, he’d skip this step altogether and deal with it when it came. But my nervous system LOVES having these individual buckets with their little labels, just filling up with savings.
It’s all about sleeping well at night, is it not?
Questions?
As I said at the beginning of this post- this is exactly the kind of information I was looking for when I was dreaming of our early retirement travels.
If you are now in that boat too, please drop your questions about our budget below, or feel free to send me an email. And if you feel that I left anything out, please let me know that too.
I’m so happy to chat with fellow FI folks and future slow travelers! Have a great week, everyone- and thanks for being here.