Thanks for the responses! I was so nervous prior to actually retiring, and OMY has such a strong pull. It wasn't easy to actually go through with it, but in retrospect, it is the best decision we ever made (you know, in addition to all the decisions (and luck) that led us to get here in the first place).
Congrats and thanks so much for sharing. For us, our most expensive line item is travel which includes, flights, car rentals, and lodging as well as eating out while one the road, and we do tend to cook depending on the capabilities of a particular trip. I suspect that when we FIRE completely our travel budget will increase even more. If you don't mind me asking, how much are these trips running you and how are you keeping the costs down. Sure Air b&b can be less than a hotel but it is still pretty expensive when adding it up over so many trips. Congrats again and I hope you share a 1 year anniversary FIRE post as well.
Travel is the biggest line item in our budget, too. I don't have it broken out by trip, but we've spent about $8000 on roughly 12 weeks of travel so far (not including our upcoming trip to Ireland).
Transportation: The biggest way to save money is to drive, not fly, wherever possible (unless you can get a great deal). We've spent a lot of time in the car :-) We also both signed up for credit cars that gave us incentive miles, and use those cards exclusively. We used miles to buy one set of plane tickets. I also have an eRewards account where I answer surveys and get airline miles in return. Right now, we have over 200K miles to use. For flights, we always search for flexible dates, and are willing (and able!) to fly at off hours or mid-week, or to accept longer layovers if needed.
Lodging: Air B&Bs can add up over time, but I think it still is a cost savings as long as you can get one with a kitchen (and use it!). We also aren't really picky. As long as it's clean and safe, it doesn't have to be big or fancy, so ours have averaged around $65 per night. We stay with friends and family whenever we can. We were really lucky with Hawaii--we were cat-sitting for an old high school friend of my husband's, so we had a free place to stay in Honolulu and a car to use as well. Without that, it would have been
a lot more expensive! (I'm allergic to cats, but for 3 free weeks, I bought some Allegra and packed my bags.)
Food: We cook on the road all the time. We pack a cooler in the car, and stop at rest stops and make sandwiches rather than eating out (it's so much healthier, too!). We grocery shop when on the road, and pack a lunch and snacks for our day trips. We have a box of must-haves for the kitchen that we travel with since some kitchens aren't well stocked: spices, vegetable peeler, can opener, cork screw, a good sharp knife, non-stick electric skillet, etc. I'd guess during a week of travel, we might go out for a meal once (lunch if we can, which tends to be less expensive). We also love hitting happy hours for cheaper food and drinks. We are never afraid to ask for doggie bags for leftovers to make the cost per meal lower.
Ireland in September is really the first trip where we both can't drive and aren't staying at least a portion of the time with family or friends. RT direct flights, rental car for 24 days, and Air B&Bs for 28 nights is $4300 so far. It's a lot, but one of the primary reasons we wanted to retire early was to travel while (relatively) young and healthy, so I'm trying to keep that in mind as we plan. All of the Air B&Bs have kitchens, so we plan on grocery shopping there and cooking as much as we can (of course there will be pub expenses!). Many also have laundry, so we're packing light and not checking any bags. We saw a good deal on Aer Lingus, and jumped on it. Our credit card offers Auto Rental CDW coverage in Ireland, so that helped keep the car cost down.