possible in the realm of the holiday industry is to book a flight with Ryanair.

but as much as I love the place the beer prices in Sweden are ridiculously high - certainly not a place for a stag weekend!

Once paid £47 for a breakfast of 2 orange juices and 2 hot chocolates with churros on the Ramblas in Barcelona. I challenged the bill to told "Yes the bill is correct but expensive". What really hurt was that breakfast was in our rate at the hotel but my 6 year old daughter had wanted to eat out. The mood was lightened when I was stood at check-in that night at the airport and recognised one of the other customers who had also challenged his bill that morning. He told me it had been just as expensive when he had been there the day before!

Also somehow managed to pay just over £100 for a meal for four at a hawker centre in Singapore, where you can eat like a king for £5 each. The meal was fabulous which was our only consolation.

I sometimes think you get into holiday mode or I must just have mug written on my face.

I was staying in central Paris in April, and wherever I went , whether it was the Louvre or the Irish bar, the cosat of what passes for a pint was 7 Euros minimum. The cheapest beer was at the airport, of all places.

Paris is the wrong place for a cheap drinking holiday at the best of times, even before you factor in the lousy exchange rate.

If you want guidance on beer prices, try here : http://www.pintprice.com/

Managed to pay the equivalent of £5 for a half pint bottle of Heineken in an "international" hotel when the little shop next to the hotel was selling 5 x 1 pint bottles for £4.

Similarlly in another "international" hotel in Ecuador I was charged $70 for 3 double whiskeys (about the average weekly wage of a middle class Ecuadorian).

At the other end of the scale I have eaten like royalty in India for less than a fiver for two of us.

for 2 ice creams, a cup of coffee and a small can of sprite, in Rome this April.

They certainly saw us coming, but to be fair, the ice cream was delicious and doused in alcohol. This was in a beautiful, small square where tourists were easily cornered, other places weren't so bad.

we ordered 2 pizzas, 2 cokes, 1 coffee and 1 ice cream. 64 euro!!(can't figure out how to type euro sign!!)

when I received a bill for something approaching £100 in Venice for two club sandwiches and two cokes some time ago.

Frankly, it could have been closer to £200. I couldn't really tell as it was in Lira days and there were so many noughts that I was getting a little cross-eyed.

I didn't really mind as that was in our "Dinky" as opposed to "Sitcom" days - and we were on the terrace of a hotel overlooking the Grand Canal on a beautiful Spring day and there are few finer locations known to Man.

Once you do have kids - of course - you can forget ever having a cheap holiday again - condemned as you are to travelling only at certain times.

The adoption of the Euro (particularly in previously inexpensive destinations) and the near parity with the pound of late doesn't help.

Two nights in Disneyland Paris Hotel (not one right in the middle, the next tier out) = €730.

Plus, two-day-two-park entry tickets = £400

And I haven't bought a burger and an ice cream yet....and it doesn't include price of Eurostar.

So a grand for 2 nights basically... feckin' ridiculous.

€400 for a bottle of vodka at Pacha in Ibiza seems a real bargain now

Cape Town. Cheap cheap! £1.20 a pint. £1.80 for tabs. Meal for 2 with a bottle of great sa wine for under £30. Lovely b&b's from £15 upwards. I should become a travel agent!

In the French Alps is legendary for the scandalous prices charged. My record one was when I was handed a bill for €150 for a beer and a vin chaud. I questioned this and the waiter apologised profusely and brought the proper bill for a less ridiculous €15. He'd pressed the "Russians" button on the till by accident, he explained. In lots of bars, this is the norm. They all loathe the Russians and rip the eyes out of them in prices in the hope that they'll go away. The local chamber of commerce wouldn't let Roman Abramovitch buy a chalet there at any price.

We have friends in Prague and Barca who know the best, and least rip-offy places, to go to achieve major levels of trolleydom at the least cost.
The good thing about th'interweb now is that there are a lot of independent review sites that will warn you of places that will try to get a second mortgage out of you.

I've been to all four in the last couple of years, and never paid anything like these prices. Just avoid the tourist hotspots.
I did get my wallet nicked in the Rome metro, though

€24.95. In, er, Dublin apparently.

a packet of shortbread designed for dwarf starfish, a bottle of water (small) and a cup of tea - £6.50

"We accept Euros too" grinned our attendant siren of the skies.