I took my family to Disneyland, but these experiences were cheaper and better

Taking her family on the trip of a lifetime - while on a strict budget - this traveller discovered that the most authentic experiences aren't always the ones you can buy. 

Perhaps the travel we imagine ourselves having – immersive and deeply connected to local customs and culture – is as price-sensitive as the weekly grocery shop. We say we want nutrient-rich food, but trolleys are full of processed convenience and cheap lollies. Like organic finger limes, is travel authenticity out of reach for the budget-squeezed masses?

I tested this theory on a recent three-month overseas holiday with my family of five. First stop Disneyland, then crossing California in an RV, self-driving around the farthest reaches of Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula, wrapped up with a Caribbean cruise. Trip of a lifetime, indeed, but on a budget tight enough to involve mouldy hostel rooms, instant noodles and lying about the kids’ ages to score cheap tickets. With these restrictions, I wondered whether we were missing out on – or earning – the most authentic travel experiences.

The answer is as slippery as defining “authenticity”. To some, it may mean experiencing something “real” versus fabricating it for the ’Gram. It’s not about consuming the standard tourist platter, lazy Susan-style, but is also not as simple as asking “would a local do this?” In seeking authenticity on my trip, my family’s financial restrictions sometimes worked for us and sometimes against. The biggest determining factor was our location.

A visit to Disneyland is the epitome of family travel - but living the dream isn't easy when you're on a limited budget.

Visiting Disneyland sets the budget bells ringing. But its smile-plastered princesses, fake rocks and manufactured moviescapes are a shot of pure American authenticity. Staying at an on-site resort – too big a stretch for my family – is often referred to as “being in the Disney bubble”, an ideal experience. Our immersion screeched to a less-than-ideal halt at the outside traffic lights where a macaw’s wing was clipped for tourist photos. Disneyland could be the poster child for purchased attractions: the bigger your budget, the more access to a kind of holiday authenticity.

Without spending up on Tulum’s beachside hotels, wellness retreats and salt-crusted mezcal cocktails, our cash afforded us the rubbish-strewn, pot-holed shanty side of town. As a result, I saw the former fishing village as one struggling with overtourism – our cement dust-sprinkled Airbnb condo no doubt part of the problem. It’s a mismatch to Tulum’s heavily photographed street sign, “Follow That Dream”. In Mexico, whimsical journeys of self-discovery seemed to cost more than we could afford.

Free and authentic: Parachicos parade in Chiapa de Corzo, Mexico.

But anywhere the attraction was “culture”, lack of money was not an obstacle. We spent hours watching Santa Monica’s Marvel-fit locals perform acroyoga or swing along the ring sets of the original Muscle Beach. In Mexico’s highlands, brush-headed and colourfully masked residents of Chiapa de Corzo formed a stomping, hand-rattling, drumming mass of costumed parachicos. This annual festival was no tourist reproduction but rather a Unesco-defined event of “Intangible Cultural Heritage”. For nix.

Likewise, whenever the attraction was “nature”, barely a dime – or peso – left my wallet. Winding up foggy roads into the Sierra Nevada, the giant sequoia trees, immense granite outcrops and expansive vistas of Sequoia, Kings Canyon and Yosemite national parks are (nearly) free to gaze at, touch and hike. Or a rustic riverside cabin well off the tourist trail in the depths of Mexico’s Chiapas jungle, surrounded by howler monkeys and squawking scarlet macaws. More money could increase the comfort factor, but not measures of awe.

The breath-taking scenery of Yosemite National Park: Easy on the eyes and the wallet.

Travel is algebra, basically: time plus money equals experience, where longer journeys decrease cash available per day. Get it right for an authenticity upshot. Our long trip added up with laundromats, petrol stations, barber visits, playgrounds and markets. All of which led to closer ties with a local way of life. A game of gridiron touch footy in Fresno’s ’burbs with American kids telling us the rules; a one-word soccer match – ¿Jugar? (Play?) – in Tulum’s main square; a cheap burger dinner in a Yosemite diner next to rock-climbing dirtbags; a quick taco lunch in the Chiapa de Corso markets, propped on plastic stools next to a maskless parachico refuelling after the parade.

Which brings me to food. Chefs elevating regional ingredients to experiential dining was, sadly, out of reach. At the lower end of the financial spectrum are supermarkets, the greatest of cultural immersions. I lingered over grocery shops, delighting in Anaheim’s Latino stores chockas with dried chillies, swooning over Whole Foods, and later becoming adept in selecting four-cent avocados alongside 10-litre bottles of agua. Perhaps authenticity was right there in my trolley after all.

The writer travelled with support from Cruise America.

Originally published as I took my family to Disneyland, but these experiences were cheaper and better