One month (ish) in Spain
 

So I'll be coming into some cash in the spring and I've always wanted to visit Spain. I'm still a student so I'll be leaving after the winter semester (which ends late April) and I want to be home by mid-June at the latest.

Not including airfare, I'll be budgeting about 4000 Canadian dollars (about 3650 American, 2760 Euros). I think a train pass should cost me between four and six hundred dollars. That gives me $3400 to $3600 to spend five-ish weeks in Spain.

I really, really like my wine, and one of the big reasons I want to go to Spain is because some of my favourite wines are Spanish. I speak a small amount of Spanish and I'm fluent in French, if that will help.

I don't need to eat out at all. I'd like to have a couple of Tapas meals, and other than those, I'll be eating grocery store sandwiches and drinking Macdonald's coffee the entire trip. I'm also planning on staying at the cheapest hostels I can find, and wherever possible, couchsurfing.

What can't I miss? Will that be enough money? What is the best region for cheap wine? Are there any good festivals to check out?

Any info would be fantastic! Thanks in advance.

Dan

You might survive 3 weeks, maybe 4, if you're lucky. You can find inexpensive wine just about everywhere, as cheap as €2/bottle in some places, if you want to hang out in the park and sip your vintage from the paper cup you picked up at MacDs.

You will likely find some very helpful information in the guidebooks by the Rough Guide or Lonely Planet.

May is serious festival time in Spain, especially in the capital Madrid and in Andalucia in the South: http://www.spanish-fiestas.com/festivals/

Excellent time of year to go to both Madrid and Andalucia, spring is here, but the summer heat is some weeks away.

You've also got the flamenco inspired Spring fair in Cordoba by the end of May: http://www.spanish-fiestas.com/festivals/

If you're looking for a very genuine and Spanish experience, take a closer look at the Rocio pilgrimage. Sleep under the sky and I can promise a fair share of not too expensive red wine ;-) http://www.spanish-fiestas.com/festivals/el-rocio/

I have no idea how much your dollars will last for. Going on from Kja's advice they have some good postings about budgeting in this thread: https://www.lonelyplanet.com/thorntr...before-posting

Do yourself a favour and acquire a good guide book and read it.
Come back with questions that have not been answered by that book or cannot be answered with a simple google.

First you talk about Canadian dollars, then American, then Euros. The 3400-36000 you mention for spending has a dollar sign but you don't say if that's American or Canadian and there's a difference. Anyway, Spain uses the Euro, so all prices there will be in Euros.

You could probably survive if you were coachsurfing all of the time. But then you'd be dependent on finding suitable hosts in places you actually want to see.

You mention the wine as your big reason for going to Spain. Do you only want to sit in a bar and drink wine all day? Or do you want to do some actual sightseeing while you are there? Most big tourist sights will cost money to get into, although you can see some of them from the outside.

About 2000€ for five weeks in Spain incl. lodging is perfectly doable (57€/day)

Nerja as an example for 45€/day:

Stay in excellent value Hostal Mena close to the sea and right in the center of town. Individual room with private bathroom is 25€ in May. http://www.hostalmena.es/hostal/eng/

For lunch, buy some food at the grocery store, or have a three course lunch with wine included for 8,50€ (Soup/salad - grilled fish/steak and dessert) at excellent and very popular freiduria La Marina. Dozens of places with similar lunch bargains all around town (as in restaurants all over Spain). http://www.guideofnerja.com/pages/gu.../marina_en.htm
http://www.tripadvisor.com/Restauran...Andalucia.html http://www.guideofnerja.com/pages/gu.../marina_en.htm

Free tapas with every glass of wine (1,50-2€) in most bars and restaurants in Nerja. Usually a great variety of excellent tapas to choose, in many places directly from the grill. Means you can have some six glasses of wine and six hearty tapas for some 10€. Expect to pay a little more for the finer wines. For example excellent wines in El Niño which also serves fine tapas: http://mynerja.com/view/bars/el-nino/

If you go for the three course restaurant lunch, then we are at some 45€, and you'll have some 12€ extra/day. If you buy your lunch in the grocery store, you'll have an extra 17€/day.

Nerja: http://www.nerjatoday.com/

Well Andalucia has the most awesome historical sites. Seville and Granada are not to be missed. Madrid has the best museums. Toledo, Cordoba, Malaga, Cadiz are also fantastic places. I would go there but I would drink red wine from Rioja and white wine from Galicia as that is where the best wine comes from IMO.