How much does it cost to drive to South America?? And the answer is…
$55,991.85
Now, there are a few caveats that go along with this number. First, there are a whole mountain of factors that go into determining the ultimate cost of a trip like this: what vehicle you drive, how long you go for, how often you camp vs. pay for your lodging, how often you eat out, how much you drink, how many “tourist” activities you do, how many souvenirs you buy, if you buy health/travel insurance, if you plan any flights home during your trip, and on and on… Even things that should cost the same for everyone, like the cost of gas, or shipping, are invariably variable. Our gas costs from last year, for instance, would be drastically different than they would be if we went on this trip this year- the average price for a gallon of gas here in the US has gone up by more than a dollar since we left home.
In the end, the dollar amount listed above is pretty much only indicative of our trip. As with any travel, everyone does it differently, and thus the cost for us could be substantially higher or lower than for another couple. Compared to other travelers we met and read about on the internet, doing the same trip, I would say we weigh in on the slightly more expensive end of the spectrum.
To give a basis for our costs, a simple description of our trip and traveling style would go something like this: a 10-month, 28,000 mile odyssey from Fort Collins, Colorado to Ushuaia, Argentina, done in a 95’ Toyota Tacoma that we already owned, by two young out-doorsy Coloradoans, who love camping and hiking, but appreciate a comfy, secure, air-conditioned hotel room every now and then, who figure you might as well see and do things while you are there, because you don’t know when you’ll be back, and who are not reckless with their money, but are not miserly either- I will go to great lengths to secure a “good deal” (many times to the consternation of my wife), but will conversely lay down a stack of cash for something that I feel I would regret not buying or experiencing. Kacey’s “potential regret list” does not always align with mine, but we accommodate each other as a rule, and everybody goes home happy- which is the whole point, right?
When we were planning our trip, I searched the internet for countless hours trying to find info on how much these kinds of trips cost. The lack of information was frustrating, and the miniscule amount that I did find was unhelpfully general in scope- similar to the grand total number at the top of this page. A few sites did provide a slightly more detailed breakdown of average daily costs, some even by country, but as I pointed out above, there are so many factors that add to trip cost, I was forever wanting a more comprehensive analysis of these previous totals.
So, with that in mind, during our trip, Kacey and I made a point of recording every dollar we spent, down to the last penny, peseta, centavo, you name it. For practicality sake, I have summarized this information into a few tables and charts shown here. I don’t think too many people will find this information all that interesting, but we are providing it here as a resource to discerning overlanders in the planning stages of their own South American adventure. If you want the full spreadsheets, with line by line details of our expenses, you can download the Excel files by clicking on the links below.
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95 Deg Summary Table
95 Deg APD Chart 1
95 Deg ADP Chart 2
We also recorded a lot of data about gas prices, driving distances, and gas mileage. Unless you are driving our exact same truck, our gas mileage might not be very relevant, but I think that you can infer some valuable information about the relative quality of gas and the road conditions from country to country, and apply these fluctuations in our gas mileage to your own vehicles standard gas mileage to get an idea of how your car or truck might perform.
95 Deg Gas Prices
95 Deg Gas Mileage
Your next question will invariably be “How in the hell did you pay for it??” Well, to put it simply, we saved. A lot. It helped, of course, that I had a good job as an ex-pat working for an engineering company on a project in Brazil, and that by the time we left on our trip we made sure to have no debt, no loans, and no bills. An additional little bump we got was from a little tax trick called the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion- which basically exempts a large portion of your income made outside of the US from federal taxes, if you are physically outside of the US for 11 months in a 12 month period. As it happened, I was only in Brazil for about 6 months (conveniently short enough that I was exempt from Brazilian income tax), and we realized that going on this trip would be the perfect way to extend my hiatus from the US for long enough to qualify for the US income tax exclusion. This certainly wasn’t the only reason we decided to spend a year driving to South America, but the knowledge that staying out of the country for a few more months would save me in taxes the equivalent amount as I would make working at a desk job for 3 or 4 months back home, was understandably a big motivating factor.
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