Will I be able to survive for 1 month in London with £20 per day(lodging is arranged separately)?

Question

I am reaching London within 2 weeks time. My lodging is already taken care of. Will I be able to live with £20 per day in London? This will include the expense for food and moving around just a bit(by bus).
Is any kind of meal available for less than £7?
How much does coke cost in London?
What will be the climate like in November? Will I require warm cloths?
Thanks for any suggestions

Answer 1

hi london is cold the now so yes you will need, hat scarf and gloves and winter coat/jacket. a can of coke can be anything from 0.70p-£2. the cost of living in the city is high, statistics released yesterday said the average cost of a pub lunch is over £10, but you will get a meal for less than that, you could go to sandwich bars and macdonalds and these are cheaper. if the £20 is for all meals and travel you definately will not have enough money everyday.

Answer 2

If all else fails a McDonalds Happy Meal with drinks and fries should cost less than £7, even in London, which is more expensive than the rest of the UK. There are plenty of lower-end cafes and fast-food joints that will do a meal for that price. It is only restuarants and pubs that should be avoided. Coke (presumambly the drink and not the drug) will vary in price depending on where you buy it. If you're anywhere near a tourist area the price will be sky high, but in any normal shop or supermarket you should expect to pay about 60p for a can of the branded version, and less for a cheaper brand. I'd suggest going to a supermarket and stocking up on 6 packs of drinks and whatever else you can get away with doing for food if you have the facilities to cook anything for yourself - a bowl of rice and pasta in a saucepan or microwave will almost certainly be cheaper than eating out.

Travel will eat into your budget quite a lot. A daily travel or Oyster card will be your best bet and give unlimited travel within certain zones of London for about £5 a day. It certainly won't give you much to play with, but you could get by if you were being really frugal. Students do it all the time, but that doesn't mean it will be easy or comfortable. If breakfast is included in your lodging bill, then make the most of it.

The climate is a hard one to tell. The clocks will have moved back an hour then, so the nights will start to draw in and it will get darker earlier. Realistically, you should prepare for all eventualities - it could be rain one day, sunny the next. It could be a fairly warm 16C in the day, but dip below freezing at night. November is a little too early for snow, but if Al Gore is to be believed about global warming, then just about anything is possible. Britain's climate is unpredictable at the best of times.

Answer 3

You should be alright if you're careful with your money. You'll probably get breakfast where you're staying, make the most of it, buy bread and cheese to keep in your room to make sandwiches for lunch and that leaves the bulk of your money to spend on an evening meal (or do it the other way round). If you get pizza or go to a noodle bar you should be able to get a hot meal for about £6-7. You also can get cheap meals at University of London Union and other Student Union venues too.

I assume you mean Coca-Cola - I think it's about £1 a can, but I don't drink fizzy drinks.

Walk as much as you can, it's a great way to see London and cheap too! Get a pay as you go Oyster card and use buses when it's too far to walk.

The Kensington Museums are free, and so are many of the art galleries. If the weather is fine there's plenty to see just by walking around with a guide book; there's history around every corner!

Have a good trip...

Answer 4

You can but you won't be doing that much, i would buy a travel oyster card which saves a bundle on public transport, and look around for decent cafes where you can get meals for less than £7.00 you have to be a bit canny where eating out is concerned as it is now the most expensive place to live and eat. As to coke, i am assuming you mean the drink variety, buy from a supermarket, its generally cheaper.
If you are into museums and art galleries, many are free, but going to the movies is expensive, try in early part of the day when its a bit cheaper. I am talking about mostly the centre of London, where things are considerably dearer that the outskirts. November can be very cold so bring warm clothes.

Answer 5

I would suggest that you buy your food from the supermarket it is a lot cheaper. Buy the supermarket own brands which are cheaper than the well known ones.Find out if there is a Lidl or Aldi near where you will be as they are quite cheap and some of their items are really good value. Even if you don't have a fridge you could buy a loaf of bread, some butter and fillings that don't need to be in the fridge for your lunches. If you really cant do without coke supermarkets do their own brands or you could just buy a couple of big bottles. For breakfast Márks and Spencers sell croissants and pain au chocolats. A cafeteria or takeaway will cost you a lot more. You could make a flask of coffee for the day .Cheap meals to cook are eggs, pasta, potatoes, baked beans. If you are cooking pasta one night you can make some extra for lunch the next day by just adding tuna and mayonnaise. It will be tight on this budget but you might be able to do it. If you allow six pounds to travel then you have fourteen to spend on food. Good luck

Answer 6

Yes, you can live quite easily for £20 a day.

If you have minimal cooking facilities you can buy supermarket ready meals for about £2. Or eat in Subway for £3 (including a soft drink). There are plenty of cheap cafes around once you get to know the place. £10 a day should be enough to spend on food.

Is coke the fuel, the drug or the drink? Tap water is safe to drink: you won't need to buy expensive soft drinks. It's cheaper to buy those in large 2 litre bottles which shouldn't cost more than £2. Shop around.

It could be cold in November. You will need warm clothes.

Answer 7

London is a very expensive city but can be done on a budget if you know where to look. You can survive if you're smart and don't give in to temptation! It will be very cold and you will need boots, warm trousers, a long woollen coat or padded jacket, gloves a hat and a scarf. You can get an Oyster travel card but I don't know where you are staying so can't tell you how much it is for the zone you are staying in. If you want all zones it will cost £43 for 7 days. (bring a passport sized photo for this) If you are happy just to use the bus you can get a bus pass Oyster which is much cheaper. As for how much a can of coke costs it's about 50p a can in most shops but if you buy it in a bar it's about £2. If you're talking about the drug then I'm afraid I can't help you there!

There are cheap sandwich shops i.e. Benjy's where you'll get cheaper sandwiches. If you want to go out for a drink, stick to old fahioned pubs rather than bars or clubs as the drinks will be cheaper there. Beer is about £3 a pint. Try and stay off the tourist track (Leicester Square, Covent Garden, Westminster, Piccadilly, Oxford Street) as prices are higher in these areas. It will be cheaper to go to a Lidl's supermarket to buy beer / cola / crisps etc rather than buying these in local shops. If you want to go out to eat you can get some good "all you can eat" buffet meals in Chinatown. (next to Leicester Square) have a look at a few and find out which one is cheapest.

You can get free newspapers from most tube and train stations in the mornings and evenings rather than buying one. If you want a cheap cinema then go to the Prince Charles Cinema off Leicester Square - they're not the newest films but at least it's a night out. If you fancy a curry then Brick Lane in the East End has plentiful curry houses that are a fraction of the cost of the ones in the West End. If you need clothes then you could go to Charity Shops which are a great place to find bargains.
If you want to do some culture then great news! All of Londons museums and art galleries are free! That means you can visit the Tate Modern, National Gallery, Natural History Museum, British Museum, Science Museum, V&A Museum etc. (just remember to bring a packed lunch as their restaurants are bad and expensive).
Borough market is a great place to go to pick up picnic lunches and cheap bits and pieces and fruit.

http://www.londontravelpass.com/prices.asp
http://www.lidl.co.uk/uk/home.nsf/pages/i.homehttp://www.princecharlescinema.com/
http://www.nhm.ac.uk/

Answer 8

It will be cold, so wear warm clothes.

You can often get meal deals from Smiths, Boots or superdrug where you can buy a sandwich and a drink (e.g. coke) for around £3.00 for your lunch.
For the evening, pub meals are often cheaper than a restaurant, and often very good.
For getting around in central London you can get a travel card which you can use on tubes and buses. A daily card is around £5-6. It is worth going in to a tourist information bureau to see if there are any special travel cards for tourists.

If you want to do a bus tour of London, I think it costs between £15 -£20 for a 24 hour ticket. For that you can hop on and off the tour buses, which stop at most tourist attractions, and you will get a boat tour included. If you get the ticket at 12.00 noon on one day, you can use it until 12.00 the next day.

Restaurants can be very expensive, and £20 wouldn't buy you a meal in most of them, so I'd avoid them if I were you.

Buy your coke from Boots, smiths, newsagent etc. It's cheaper than getting it in a pub. You can buy a 2 litre bottle for less than £2.00. Around £1.60 I think, but my info is a bit out of date.

Have a good trip!

Answer 9

Coming to london in november is not too cold the average temp would be about 10 degrees C.

As for getting around the first place you need to go is your nearest underground station or failing than a news agent and ask for a oyster card. It costs just £3 then you can top it up with £5 every couple of days. Believe me in the long run it will save money as normal bus fares are £2 but with an oyster card its only 90 pence a ride.

As for food This depends on your taste your best bet is to go to supermarkets for food shopping as there is everything for everyones taste. you can get some great deals if you shop around look for the BOGOF (buy one get one free) deals and stick to a budget of £10 a day.

If you must have coke buy a 2ltr bottle as they do tend to be the cheapest again supernarkets are cheaper depending where you go. Average price is between £1.00 for pepsi in icelands to £1.19 in tesco's again pepsi. most news agents and smaller shops tend to sell them for £1.59 for both pepsi and coke-cola.

Buy a local paper for ideas for days out there is plenty to do in london for cheap or for free. Explore the musems or parks maybe get a movie in.

Enjoy your stay here in london you will love it honestly.

Answer 10

If you can cook and use a fridge at the place you are staying, you should be able toget by on a diet of pasta and baked beans. Buying your meals at 7 pound a day would be difficult. And buying coke should definitely not be in your budget.

As for getting around, figure out whether you will be going about every day, or only on weekdays, the decide which pass you want to get. Check out the oyster pass, you get some good deals on these, definitely beter than buying individual tickets.