This past July I was on vacation at a hotel in one of the most beautiful islands of the Canary Islands (from whose name I remember). Upon entering the hotel, a staff member I placed a green bracelet on the wrist of my right hand which allowed me to access all meals and drinks the hotel provided free of charge. Yes, I’m talking about the well-known all-inclusive.
Decide the place where we spend our vacation involves choosing where we would stay. This decision is choosing your location, the services offered to their clients or their facility to find a parking nearby. But it also means choosing a bed, a decision not insignificant and can save quite remarkable.
Is it only accommodation or breakfast?
Finally. It is now one of the most desired days of the year. Come the summer holidays and many will have to choose your ideal destination. A destination that we like, we relax, we make off for a few days of daily and allow us to return with batteries fully charged to confront a new labor season.
We have the destination and now we find accommodation. We often find quiet places, well placed or simply offering the services we need. However, we rarely look at what their housing arrangements. And it is a point to keep in mind if you do not want to spend one euro more on our vacation.
Most hotels that are offering a variety of housing schemes among which you can choose: room only, bed and breakfast, half board, full board or all inclusive are some who offer many destinations, especially sunny coastal destinations and beach.
Now what should be my choice and why? The following table shows which services are offered either option:
In general, as we see in the table, the schemes differ in the amount of foods to which we have access. For example, half board breakfast and have access either to the food or to dinner, while the full board gives us access to all meals, but without access to drinks. But then how do we decide the regime we are most interested?
Choosing the appropriate system: a matter of fate and our preferences
I have a highly educated opinion about the regime to choose on our vacation: it all depends on our fate. When, for example, visited London, it makes little sense to choose a full board or all inclusive as most of the travel time we will spend exploring the city.
Overall, in the cultural visits, and even more so if we talk about big cities where we take some time to get to the hotel to rest, is much more interesting to choose a bed and breakfast, with the aim of recharge earlier in the day to visit all the tourist attractions and cultural offerings offered by large cities, and have lunch or dinner near the center of the same.
However, coastal destinations sun and beach holidays are often different from the cultural. In general, the hotel is near the beach (in some cases are even within it) or the complex itself offers all the leisure you need so that in these cases, is often more interesting to choose the regime all inclusive.
Also, if the surroundings offer a cultural appeal, the hotel itself was often undertaken to provide a small lunch to lose no time in returning to the hotel and make the most of our day, the picnic. Anyway, we can always give food to the point someday and have lunch at one of the many restaurants that, surely, will be close to the tourist.
In short, all inclusive gives us greater flexibility in taking meals at the resort, but in return, has a higher cost. So what interests us?
And how much we can save?
In the room I mentioned in the introduction to this article, a traditional destination for sun and beach, I found that an all-inclusive ideal, since the difference between this regime and one room only is not excessive and saving on meals makes it worth watching.
For example, imagine a couple who will spend a week’s holiday to the Canary Islands. The difference in a three star hotel between an accommodation only and one all-inclusive is $ 200, which is a daily difference of approximately 15 euros per person per day.
Given this data, offset only the choice of accommodation only if the sum of the amounts of breakfast, lunch, dinner and drinks is less than 15 euros. It seems reasonable that only one of the meals and the cost can be so generally compensates. In fact, if every day we spent 30 euros per person per day on food and drink during our holiday, and we will have saved 15 euros, half of what we had spent on the case you have chosen a scheme without meals.
Anyway, not always worth the all inclusive or full board in large cities, go to the hotel for dinner or lunch can be a transport cost can not outweigh the choice of the scheme, apart from the loss of time involved. In short, each person has a different interest and for each, there is a different accommodation arrangements. It is important to do the numbers and see if compensated financially. Of the rest, we only have to worry about enjoying our holiday.