AMSTERDAM — How do you like your beaches? Upscale with top-of-the-line amenities, or bare bones and barren with no frills attached?
Online travel specialist TravelBird has just released its annual Beach Price Index, featuring more than 300 seaside locations from 70 countries around the world. It first examined an extensive catalogue of the world’s most popular beaches, before reducing this to a final shortlist of just over 300 locations, ranked according to the cost of spending a day at each.
To calculate their affordability, the price of five essentials were researched for each destination: the cost of a bottle of sun cream, a bottle of water, a beer, lunch and an ice cream. The sum of these five essentials determined the final affordability ranking of each seaside location, giving travellers a handy guide as to where to go for the most expensive and cheapest stretches of beach.
The 10 most expensive beaches are (all prices in US dollars):
- Kristiansand Beach, Norway ($64.61)
- Huk Beach, Norway ($61.94)
- Solastranda, Norway ($60.33)
- Mareto Plage Publique, French Polynesia ($58.69)
- La Plage de Maui, French Polynesia ($58.40)
- Akrasanden, Norway ($57.98)
- Hamresanden, Norway (57.14)
- Ribersborg Beach, Sweden ($55.33)
- Anse Vata, New Caledonia ($55.14)
- Anse Georgette, Seychelles ($53.36)
In short, Norway’s beaches appear to be top notch and top dollar!
In contrast, here are the 10 most affordable beaches:
- Cua Dai Beach, Vietnam ($13.18)
- City Beach, Vietnam ($13.90)
- Long Beach, Vietnam ($14.42)
- Marsa Nayzak, Egypt ($16.44)
- Sunken City, Egypt ($16.82)
- Varkala Beach, India ($17.61)
- Benaulim Beach, India ($17.92)
- Palolem Beach, India ($18.21)
- Cavelossim Beach, India ($18.41)
- Sharm El-Naga Bay, Egypt ($18.57)
Canada appeared on the list as well, with the following results:
118. Grand Beach, Manitoba ($38.14)
121. Brady’s Beach, British Columbia ($37.67)
136. Wasaga Beach, Ontario ($36.90)
149. Parlee Beach, New Brunswick ($35.92)
The Index also found that the most expensive bottle of sun cream was purchased in The Seychelles at a price of $26.63 (200ml). In contrast, a bottle cost just $1.95 in Cua Dai Beach, Vietnam, which makes it the cheapest in the world.
As for water, the most expensive bottle is found at Huk Beach in Norway, costing $2.97 for a 500ml bottle, while the cheapest bottle of water is in Sunken City, Egypt, coming in at a whopping $0.20.
The beach with the most expensive beer globally is Huk Beach in Norway, where a 33cl bottle costs $8.83. In contrast, Soma Bay in Egypt is the seaside destination with the least expensive beer, available for just $0.63.
Norway’s Huk Beach also has the world’s most expensive ice creams, at $5.09 each. Egypt’s El Gouna is the beach with the least expensive ice creams in the world, costing just $0.52.
West Palm Beach in the American state of Florida has the world’s most expensive seaside lunch, costing $28.61 for one person. Egypt’s El Gouna is the beach with the most affordable lunches, available for just $5.63.
