Book Review: “Travel on $50/Day (or less!)” by Steve Hamlin (privately published, 113 pages).

When I was a little girl, my parents’ library included a copy of Arthur Frommer’s “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day.” Even then, this guidebook was out of date. Originally published in 1957, it was revised many times over the years with ever increasing prices. By 2007, its final edition was titled “Europe from $95 a Day.”

I don’t know whether Steve Hamlin of Huntington is familiar with Frommer’s series, but I presume he is. His latest book is titled “Travel on $50/Day (or less!): Camping in the US and Beyond.”

Hamlin is an artist and photographer whose watercolors are currently on view at North Hall in Huntington. He has spent years traveling and camping in a small van with his wife.

In the book, he explains how they have kept expenses minimal. They plot their route carefully, look for reasonable places to camp, and cook simple meals for themselves rather than dining out.

Above all, they opt for free entertainment whenever possible. They enjoy photographing nature; photos from their travels illustrate the book. They enjoy quiet time together in and out of the van. Remarkably, the $50 price tag seems to include travel, gas, and meals for the two of them, not just for one person.

“Traveling on $50/Day does involve some sacrifices, but they don’t have to mean compromising the quality of your experiences. In fact, I’d argue that they have the potential to enhance them,” Hamlin writes.

He points out that even if one doesn’t want to travel quite so austerely as he and his wife tend to, one can still pick up useful tips.

I see one big stumbling block to traveling the Hamlin way. The author doesn’t count in his price tag the labor he has expended engineering his van.

Even if I could find a reasonably priced used van, I could never manage to add all the features he has put in — power sources, refrigeration, rudimentary plumbing, internet access, and the like — without paying someone to do the work. Nevertheless, the book should inspire people who are much handier than I.

Even I can learn lessons from Hamlin’s careful planning and budgeting. Perhaps the most important lesson is to write down all one’s expenses. He seems to have done this for all his trips and uses his calculations as illustrations.

Carefully noting each expense day by day keeps the spender from getting carried away and ending the day (or trip) with an inexplicably empty wallet.

For me, the book’s best feature was to counsel me to do research when planning recreational activities. One can almost always find reasonably priced things to do and places to stay, Steve Hamlin reminds the reader. Finding those things and places can be a useful and rewarding exercise.

“Travel on $50/Day” is available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble online, as either an e-book or a paperback.

Tinky Weisblat is an award-winning writer and singer known as the Diva of Deliciousness. Visit her website, TinkyCooks.com.