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Having just a dramatic border crossing from Serbia on the overnight sleeper train, we we're excited to arrive in a place where you can take it easy. Little did we know that in the afternoon Budva really comes alive and is crawling with tourists (Like us!, we know). So we decided to have an early morning and explore the streets almost alone. We saw the sun rise over the adriatic and even got to swim in the Adriactic, TWICE. Compared to it's neighbours on the Adriatic, Budva Montenegro is an affordable place to spend a few days (We were shocked by Dubrovnik) and we highly recommend exploring super early as well as experiencing the ancient streets at night when Budva really comes alive! After this video we made it a routine to jump in the sea every morning at 5am. it was an absolute dream! Watch full video here:

According to @The Man in Seat 61 this just might be better than the Glacier Express?! With an ambition to ride a train with incredible scenery we turned to the Glacier Express. However when we looked at our budget we desperately tried to find an alternative. That ambition combined with the goal to reach the coast sooner than later we stumbled accross the Montenegro express. A GORGEOUS overnight train going all the way from Belgrade in Serbia to Bar in Montenego. To make the train ride even sweeter, we realised the price would be DRAMATICALLY cheaper than a similar option on the world famous glacier express so we bought tickets as soon as we could. Needless to say, things didn't turn out as good as they could have and we had some drama with the Serbian police at the border crossing which happened to be at about 3 in the morning. But we survived, we got through and we got to see some incredible views. Watch full video here:

We never knew that this part of Europe had such incredible foods. Honestly, it should be talk about the same way Italy is! Yesterday we caught two trains and a ride in a local persons car to cross the Romanian border into Belgrade, Serbia. We've only got one full day here and we want to make the most of it so we have written a list and are taking ourselves on a DIY Serbian food tour in Belgrade, Serbia. (Beograd) WE LOVE TRADITIONAL SERBIAN FOOD! Some of these foods will live in my dreams forever! Watch full video here:

We didn't think it would be so difficult to cross the border of countries who border each other! For some reason the Serbian and Romanian railway management stopped the direct train between the two countries leaving travellers with minimal options. Determined to do the crossing overland for the cheapest possible price, we elected to still try and make the train journey. As you'll see, the journey wasn't very straight forward and certainly didn't end up being very cheap! We are just happy that we got to cross the Romania - Serbia border by train at all! Hopefully this is helpful for anyone wanting to make the same journey! Watch full video here:

Having finished one of the best fortnights of our lives driving around Romania. We wanted to treat ourselves to a comfortable stay in the some Romanian mountains that our journey started, the Apuseni mountains. For this comfortable stay we decided to take up residence in an awesome Mongolian yurt who's owners have the goal to combine nature with luxury and comfort (Spoilers, they nailed it) There's something magical about having a red wine as the rain comes down and a fire crackles away. Watch full video here:

So why record our expenses? We wrestled with the idea of spending all our money on experiences versus knuckling down at work in an attempt to set ourselves up for the future. Ultimately, we decided that houses can burn down, investments can be lost and money can be wasted but memories can never be taken from you. We wanted to solidify those memories by creating videos. But also wanted to show people a realistic view of what a full-time travel lifestyle would cost. When I went looking for something similar they were few and far between, so I wanted to do something for the next person who comes looking. And so, a terrible and laborious google sheet was born. It's since been updated many times and is much easier to manage. All of the data here is from that sheet. Where did the money come from? When we tell people that we are travelling full-time, they tend to have the same few comments. We must have wealthy parents who are paying for everything, or that we have come into inheritance or a lottery win or something else crazy. While we both acknowledge we are very privileged to be able to earn an income (and both have jobs unaffected by the pandemic) - so all the money we have saved up has been solely from working at jobs that we held without any tertiary education. I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed putting it together! What you came here for: Breakdown of what's below: Expenses YouTube Analytics Summary Expense Report Expense by category This is a quick reference category breakdown of our expenses. This month we decided to rent a car in Romania and we had seen another couple do it for less than $10 a day! so we paid for an international drivers permit. Then we realised that supply and demand exists and that the world just went through the worst pandemic for 100 years. The cheapest we could find a car was for $50 a day, but we now had a sunk cost in our IDP and wanted to go through with it! This, as well as an air bnb dispute that happened later were the biggest contributors to our mega overspend in August! Accommodations Expenses This is what happens when a trusted house sitters does not fit within our itinerary! Few big expenses to note: The apartment in Floresti was the last available in the area because there was a big festival in a neighbouring town. Our Kotor accommodation is actually supposed to be more, but because the original place we booked flat-out lied about it's location, air bnb gave us a little bit of a credit to rebook somewhere else. This was the cheapest place available and was still over $100 a night. (It was amazing though) and finally, Dubrovnik is expensive. We stayed a 45 minute walk from anything notable and it was still over $100 a night. okay i'll stop complaining now, Bosnia accommodation is much more affordable! Transport Expenses Things to note: The numbers are different to the 'Expenses by Category' Section. that's because in that section I use the Master sheet which includes small transports like Ubers, Grabs and Taxis which I thought wouldn't add value in this section! (I kept the total the same) Not too bad of a month for transport expenses. We filled the car up 3 times while on the road. The short range busses were affordable enough and the only big expense was the first class overnight train from Belgrade to Bar. That is supposed to be one of the most scenic trains in Europe but we DID have to bribe a Serbian police officer. You can watch that video here. Fixed Costs Insurance is expensive but worth it. Safety wing is our insurer of choice, they seemed to offer the most comprehensive cover especially when lots of countries needed specific types of insurance during the pandemic, they were great! Adobe is the software we used to edit our YouTube videos Epidemic sound is where we get all our music from, you can get a free trial with this link*: https://share.epidemicsound.com/i1nhpc Income Report YouTube Analytics It looks like we are starting to slowly get back on the horse in August. We had a video we loved creating (because it involves eating food) start to take off a little bit which was helping us stay afloat through the month. Watch it here! You can see that the views still pale in comparison to what we were experiencing in South East Asia but we certainly feel a sense of accomplishment being in an upward trend again! Summary Final balance at the end of June Expenses: -$4,116.96 Income: +$425.00 Change - $3,691.96 We did it again. We got sucked in to spending a lot in August and ended up renting a car for 2 weeks in Romania + over paying for accommodation by not booking them early enough! Overall the outlook of our Youtube channel has started to turn into a more positive light and we are still learning everyday what makes an entertaining video. I'm happy to report we also seem to have found a nice balance that allows us to create videos at a good pace but most importantly, really enjoy our travels everywhere we go! Next month we are heading to the expensive Italy but we also have a pretty long house sitters lined up which should help with the costs too! Fingers crossed for the best month yet! (Please let it be so!) Thank you so much if you have read this far! Editorial Note - Opinions expressed here are author's alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, hotel, airline, or other entity. This content has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of the entities included within the post. User Generated Content Disclosure - Responses are not provided or commissioned by the bank advertiser. Responses have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered. *affiliate links - we may earn commission

Top Gear were not wrong when they said this was the greatest driving road in the world! Getting a chance to drive the most beautiful road in the world is a dream come true and it was (Almost) exactly as we expected! After spending a couple of weeks exploring beautiful Romania we turned ourselves toward the biggest goal we had in this country, the Transfagarasan. This beautiful road took four years and 5000 tons of dynamite blasting through mountains to build. It is simply the greatest driving road in the world and really lives up to it's moniker! If you ever find yourself anywhere close to this area of Europe, do yourself a favour, rent a car and drive this incredible driving road. You wont be disappointed. Just make sure you see the rest of Romania too. it's incredible! Watch the full video here

We decided to spend the middle three days of our Road trip through Romania in the Brasov region or Transylvania. There was just so much to do in such a small area and we wanted to do as much as possible! Unfortunately the weather didn't agree with us when we tried to explore Brasov city but we Did get to see a 13th century citadel in Rasnov, the super famouse Bran castle (Draculas castle) AND the incredible bear sanctury (liBEARty sanctury) All in all - we had a great time over these three days and we hope you enjoy! Watch the full video here

It is crazy that we waited this long to do a food tour. Romanian food is up there with the best but rarely gets a mention! Today we run through one of the most stunning towns we've seen in Romania (Sighișoara) and get to try a list of all the best local Romanian food. Trying to not be slowed down by the jaw-droppingly beautiful town, we try a delicious and traditional donut called a Papanasi (Papanași). Then head straight to lunch where we get to try Polenta for the first time as well as some more Mici (Mititei - Which we knew we loved before today) and some of the Romanian national dish or Sarmale! We finish the day in a 500 year old cellar at 'Teos Cellar' and try a brandy with a recipe that's 300 years old! Thats older than the United States! Crazy. We LOVED trying all these foods so thanks for watching along! Watch the full video here

After a treacherous but beautiful drive up winding roads, we get to start our day high in the mountains of Transylvania, Romania. Today we hike through a jungle, find a little waterfall, explore a MASSIVE cave called Coiba Mare Cave and get underground in the famous (And freezing!) Scărişoara Glacier Cave in the Apuseni Mountains. Romania is such a stunning country and we are just warming up on this EPIC road trip! Watch the full video here