Porto’s a beautiful city! I particularly liked the hilly terrain and great views.

This stay was 7-nights…

• Accommodation –  $589.43* (includes 14€ city tax, 2€ per day. Additional information below including Ratuken, the discount program I use for cash back on most of my bookings with Rakuten**)
• Getting around locally – $12.19 (this was a 2-day pass for $9.44 and a single trip for $2.75 – Sorry, I lost track of the Euro breakdown of these)
• Living expenses – $196.60 (groceries and eating out)
• Activities – $0
• Mobile phone/data – $13.69 (Google Fi $5.91 and Airalo $7.78 – This changed recently. Because I’m outside of the US for long stretches, Google Fi has cut off my international data… find out more about it here. My new setup is a combination of Google Fi and Airalo. See below for more info and referral links)
• Medical insurance – $16.13 (I’m using SafetyWing; rates vary by age, and mine is above the base rate. If you’re interested there is a paid link/banner on the right side of the page)

Total $828.04 / 7-nights = $118.29 per

*Hotel info

• I stayed at Porto Downtown Living – Picaria Apartments reserved through Booking.com. The studio was nice and clean, and I really liked the location. It’s only about a 5-minute walk from the subway/metro station and about the same to the historic center. It was very comfortable, and the host was great; I’d definitely be happy to stay there again!

Transportation to and from varies, so I left it out of the above breakdown, along with most incidental/one-time personal costs. But for those interested, in this case, I booked a direct flight with TAP Air from Lisbon to Porto. The price, including a checked bag, was 61,09€ ($65.60). I booked it with the checked bag because I wasn’t sure if I’d need it, and it was less than $20 to buy it upfront with a couple of other things, like an express security check, instead of paying a lot more later. I took the metro into the city from the airport, but that’s included above with the day passes used during the stay. Individually the trip would cost 2,60€ ($2.75); this is 2€ for the ride itself and 0,60€ for the reloadable ticket; there didn’t seem to be a way around buying this without the reloadable card (and it’s an only thick paper with a chip inside). 

** I try to use Rakuten whenever it’s an option; why not take the money. It works with a browser add-on, and there is also a mobile app. Note from the Ratuken site, “Stores pay us a commission for sending our members to their websites, and we share it with you. It’s that simple!” If you haven’t signed up yet, and are interested, please consider using this referral link to help support me, and get a signup bonus. I use it regularly and recommend it, but please look to decide if it’s right for you. When you sign up using the link, use it spending $, we each get $! The $ varies; I’ve recently seen at $40 and $30. They state, “Offer may be modified or canceled anytime.” 

*** Google Fi provides my US phone number, free texts, and phone service for additional per-minute fees in most countries, and Airalo is an eSIM that I buy data on as I need in various parts of the world. I’ve included the Airalo $ as a per-day cost of whichever plan I had purchased to cover this period. In this case, I had the 50Gb/90day European Regional plan for $100. Prices will vary depending on the data package you purchase. If you’re interested in Google Fi and based in the U.S., you can use this paid link to sign up, which will give me a referral fee at no extra cost to you, and MAX3058 is my referral code for Airalo, which will get us both a little credit if you use it to signup and purchase a package.)

****Of course, the currency exchange varied during the stay, so for simplicity, I used a rate of 1 USD = 0,93€ for cash transactions. The accommodations and some of the daily purchases made on credit cards are entered at the converted price charged.

***** I don’t go to top-rated restaurants or into paid entry tourist attractions often. Though, I do eat out quite a bit; usually nothing special. To some extent, it’s somewhat more cost-effective this way, at least that’s what I’m telling myself. I try to be cost-conscious, eating as a local would; I think you could say like a backpacker/broke college student, that is LOL! I try to note any differences to this above. Groceries will sometimes include personal care items (i.e., toothpaste, deodorant, etc.).

I’m striving to provide helpful information for people planning trips or a nomadic lifestyle, so if you have any ideas to make these posts more useful, please let me know. You can comment/DM on social media, in the comments below, or email at (MeanderingMax@gmail.com). I appreciate your support!