Berlin On A Budget

I'm hopeless at saving money. It's one of the things that I'm trying to be better at this year. Last year I went to New York with $300, which was never going to be enough, and this year I went to Berlin with €160.

Before I went to Berlin I'd heard that it was quite an expensive city and it was safe to say that I was worrying about it. Spoiler alert: I came back with €30, which is pretty good considering we were there for seven days; so I've come up with a few tips on how to do Berlin on a budget.

1. Stay at a hostel 
What's the first thing that comes to mind when you think of the word hostel? Probably squeaky metal bunk beds with a grubby shared bathroom right? This is the second time I've stayed in a hostel with FCP and both of them have far exceeded my expectations.

We stayed in the Meininger East Side Gallery hotel and I couldn't recommend it more. It's a new build so it was modern and clean; the beds were super comfy, we got our own bathroom, and the breakfast was good too!

Not only are hostels a lot cheaper than a hotel, but they usually have kitchens for guests to use so we saved a lot of money on dinners like pasta and vegetable curry by just shopping at Aldi or Lidl. This leads me on to my second point...


2. Eat cheap 
There is no need to eat at five star restaurants every day, and admittedly it does get boring after a while. For lunch we just had small things like sandwiches or a slice of pizza from a the cafes in the train stations. We ate out a couple of times before dinner, but as I said before we did half of the dinners ourselves. There's also a lot of the common franchises in Germany like McDonalds and Subway, which aren't very cultured but it saves a load of money.

3. Have your money physically rather than paying on your card
Having the physical cash to see makes it easier to not spend much because you can see it going down.

I took my money in an envelope which I hid in one of my pockets in my handbag and then put €30 in my purse each day as my budget. If you don't feel comfortable having so much cash on you, withdraw your budgeted amount for each day each morning.


4. Free or discounted activities 
In New York I found that for most tourist things you have to spend money one way or another, but in Berlin there are loads of things to do for free. For example, you can go up the Reichstag building, which has 360 views of the city, and you don't have to pay a penny, just register before you go! The Berlin Wall is also free to go and look at, and if you walk the whole thing that's a couple of hours of your day done. The Memorial of The Murdered Jews is also free.

A lot of the museums, such as the Natural History Museum and the Helmut Newton Foundation do discounted rates for concessions such as students, making a ticket €5 instead of €10.

5. Day travel ticket
A day travel ticket which covers both the S and U Bahn, trams, and buses is only €7. This gives you the ability to jump on all of the public transport until 3am the next morning as many times as you like, so it works out so much more cheaper, especially as a lot of Berlin's highlights are located around a lot of different areas and it's worth it when it's SO cold outside!


To be honest you can probably use these tips wherever you choose to go. Both Meininger and The Generator (where we stayed in London - see my review here) have hotels all over Europe, making it so much easier to book good quality, yet affordable, accommodation, and with a bit of a Google/Pinterest search you can always find budget friendly things to do!