Bangkok cheapest

SURVEY:ONE NIGHT in Bangkok may well make a hard man humble but at least his humbling will come cheap. According to a TripAdvisor survey published this week, the Thai capital is the cheapest of 50 of the world's most popular tourist destinations it assessed.

The site’s “Trip Index” worked out how much a taxi ride of 8km, a night’s accommodation in a four-star hotel, a margarita pizza and dry Martini cost in the 50 locations and found that a tourist could get by for one day in the Thai capital for just €79.

It was an entirely different story in Paris which was declared to be the most expensive city in the world to go on holiday. The cost of one day in the city came in at €303.

Zurich finished in second place with the price of the four items working out at €268 while London was in third place with the cost of one night in the city at €264.

Finishing behind Bangkok at the other end of the scale was Beijing where a day will set you back €85. The third cheapest city in the world to visit was declared to be Sharm el-Sheikh with the cost put at €90.50.

While Dublin would, at one time, have reasonably expected to finish close to the top of the price chart, hard times have seen its prices fall considerably and, according to the index, it was the 27th most expensive place to visit and the cost of a visit was put at €157.

Dublin nearly made it into the top 10 most expensive places in the world when it came to the Martini, however, with the price of the cocktail so beloved of James Bond being put at €12, just one place outside the top 10.