UK holidays 'more expensive than going abroad'

It’s cheaper to spend your summer holiday in Greece, Turkey and Cyprus than it is to stay in the UK.

That’s the finding of a new report by Tesco Bank, which discovered that the average family would spend £2,054 on food, accommodation and tourism during a week in Athens and £1,819 during a week in Bodrum, Turkey. A week buying exactly the same items would come to £2,309 in Brighton.

The cheapest destination was Sofia in Bulgaria which would cost almost £988 less over the week than the same holiday in the UK. It was also cheaper to visit Cyprus, Hungary, Slovenia and Poland.

Sofia was found to be the cheapest place to buy suntan lotion, visit a zoo, buy beach accessories and meals at a cafe.

Budapest was the cheapest place to buy ice cream, Faro in Portugal was the cheapest for drinks at a cafe and Barcelona was the cheapest for buying souvenir T-shirts.

Ironically, Brighton was the cheapest place to hire a car – an expense many Brits won’t need to pay! The report didn’t take into account the costs of getting to the resort, but the cost of petrol and the cost of budget airline flights may be roughly equivalent for many Brits.

The average cost of a week’s holiday came to £2,076 across all destinations surveyed, 2% than last year, but the most expensive items - car hire and accommodation - rose by as much as 6%.

Total costs per destination (£):

- Reykjavik, Iceland 3,383
- Rome 2,836
- Barcelona 2,375
- Dubrovnik, Croatia 2,333
- Nice, France 2,320
- Faro, Portugal 2,262
- Brighton 2,209
- Athens 2,054
- Bodrum, Turkey 1,819
- Ljubljana, Slovenia 1,750
- Limassol, Cyprus 1,739
- Budapest 1,455
- Warsaw, Poland 1,315
- Sofia, Bulgaria 1,221

From Yahoo Travel