Cost Estimates for Your Sturgis Rally Vacation

If you’re heading to Sturgis for the Black Hills Rally and Races in Sturgis South Dakota, you may be wondering how much your trip to the Black Hills will cost. As with any vacation, it’s always best to have a budget and plan your trip around your budget. So with that in mind, here are some estimates of typical costs associated with a vacation to Sturgis, South Dakota, for the Bike Rally.

Accommodation or Camping:

Hotels in and around Sturgis can be very difficult to find during Rally week. If you can find a hotel room, expect to pay $300-$400 a night for a Super 8-type room. If you’re camping, you usually reserve a space that covers you for 15 days, allowing you time before and after the Sturgis rally. This can range from $100 to $175 per camper using a tent site. If you have an RV, expect a charge of $400 for 30-amp service or $450 for 50-amp service. Many campgrounds also charge a per camper fee on top of this, so add $100-$175 again. You can rent a house for around $2500.00 which could work for groups of bikers.

Gas:

Since you will be riding a motorcycle, you will obviously consume a good amount of gasoline. You’ll typically get about 25 miles to the gallon, so to figure gas costs, look at it as $12 per 100 miles. Take your distance to and from Sturgis and then look at your day-to-day driving. When I travel through the Black Hills, I generally travel about 300 miles a day. So for me, 1200 miles to travel to and from Sturgis and 900 touring miles gives me a fuel cost of $252.00. Of course, if you tow your motorcycle, you’ll need to adjust your costs based on the MPG your truck, car, or RV gets.

Food:

Much of the food you will eat is fast in nature. You will eat a lot of fair-type and diner-type foods. It would be fair to estimate $15 – $30 per day for food (not including alcohol) depending on where you like to eat.

Partying:

If you like to party, you can expect to spend a lot on alcohol. Much like a concert or football game, if you buy beer at a bar or camp, you can expect to pay $6-$7 per beer + tip. So how much do you drink? Take that number of beers and multiply it by $7 to get your estimate. You can save money at some campgrounds by keeping an inexpensive cooler and ice and buying beer by the case.

Total cost of trip to Sturgis:

So for a couple of passengers on a 5-day trip from the Midwest, here are the cost estimates I’ve calculated. Tent around Sturgis $300.00. Fuel for both pilots $500.00. Meals at $50 a day for the couple $250 and three days of partying $180.00 I didn’t include souvenirs but based on my figures this trip for two passengers would cost about $1230.00. I would recommend bringing $1500 and you’d be covered. As you can see, Sturgis is a very affordable vacation, but it has many cost variables that will affect the total cost of your vacation to the Sturgis Rally in the Black Hills of South Dakota.