I was looking at the exchange rates, and I was suprised how much money I"m going to have to take. I'm going around Spain for five weeks, everything will be paid for, except for the fact that I need spending money. I was thinking about taking $800.00 but then I realized that is only 660 euros, is that enough? I want to bring a decent amount of money, so what I am asking I guess is what are the prices like in Spain?

Depends a lot on where you are doing your shopping. Some areas of Madird and Barcelona would make the stores on Rodeo Drive seem cheap. Out away from the metro areas will not be that unreasonable. The further away from the central shopping district such as the Gran Via in Madrid, the more the prices come down. Stores like El Corte Ingles are comparable to Macy's and Gimbles. Small mom and pop operations will always give better deals on products.

A side note about El Corte Ingles: When my friend and I went a couple of years ago we took our wives who had never been to Spain. Almost on the first day one of the two wives notices the El Corte Ingles chain and asked what it was. Almost as if it had been rehearsed, we said it was a chain of thrift stores like GoodWill or Salvation Army. That ended the problem until almost the last day before going home. While waiting for a bus near the entrance of one of the stores it was raining and one of the women decided to go in to get out of the rain. I suppose anyone can imagine what hit the fan. That proved to be a very expensive day. Our little ploy headed off problems for almost two weeks.

Hello Anita,

I am assuming that your hotels, meals, snacks, tips, transportation, laundry, and all sundry travel expenses are being covered, right? If so, you have a daily budget of about 20 euros per day. Is that enough? It depends.

If you want to buy souvenirs, and what we girls call "pretties," 20 euros is not enough. Souvenirs are expensive. CD's are expensive, etc.

If you want to buy an ocassional postcard and splurge once a week, then you have enough.

How much should you take? Be true to yourself. If you like to buy, take what you would usually take with you when you travel around town. How much do you generally spend when you go to the local mall on the weekends? That will give you a good indication. I can tell you that the tempation to buy Spanish gifts is very strong. Everywhere you go, they sell lovely things.

Think about it.

Desert Dweller, that was a devilish jest you played on the gals!!! Corte Inglés = to Goodwill!!!! :p

I agree with both Desert Dweller and Booklady. There are so many variables involved. As Booklady asks, is really everything included? Even so, what if you decide, for example, to take a weekend away in Salamanca? Transportion, hotel and eating could take up at least 150-200 euros.

My gut reaction is that a budget of 660 euros for 5 weeks is cutting it a little close, but I may be wrong. Spain in many ways is not the bargain it was before the peseta switched to the euro.

In any event, I always advise friends to take along a credit card or ATM card if possible. You just never know and if there's one thing Spain has a lot of it's ATM machines. You can bring the 660 euros and see how far they get you. If it's enough, then no problem, but at least you'll have the comfort of knowing you can take out more (or charge) if you realize you have underbudgeted, or if something unexpected comes up, or if you simply want to go for that shopping "capricho".

A year ago was just the opposite, you could get 800 € with 600 $, so things were cheap for americans.

Now it has turned so that with 800 $ you only get 600 €, so things are a little more expensive for americans.

The thing is, that if the exchange rate was normal (say more or less 1 $ for 1 €) Spain is a 20 or 30% cheaper than the US. Our salaries are lower too. With a normal US salary you could live very well in Spain.

Of course, the best is to work for a US company in Spain as an expatriate, having a good exchange rate, and spending your dollars in Spain That would make you "el rey del mambo" as we say here

Fernando

Booklady: The gals got their revenge. That proved to be a very expensive afternoon. We did good maintaining the budget until they got into that store. We ended up buying two more suit cases.