Every country in Europe will feel more expensive this summer – except one

Imagine a world where a cup of coffee in a cafe costs 59p, where a beer in a bar is £1.54 and the bill for a three-course meal for two – complete with a bottle of wine – comes in at £16. It would make the cost of living crunch seem like a bad memory. The good news is that such a world does exist – it’s called Marmaris in Turkey.

According to the latest Holiday Money Report from the Post Office, published in March, the Turkish resort offers the lowest prices out of the 36 popular destinations that it surveyed. Its comparative shopping basket cost a total of £26.13, compared with, for example, £44.39 in the Algarve, £56.44 in Cyprus and £59.56 on the Costa del Sol. Head for Nice or Puglia, and you would have to pay about four times more than in Marmaris. It would likely be the same with a domestic break in the UK too (although it wasn’t included in the survey).

So, if you haven’t yet arranged your summer holiday, or your city break, should you be rushing to book Turkey? The Post Office survey has some limitations. Its shopping basket contains only eight items – five of which are drinks of various kinds – and for most countries it only surveys one resort.

So I’m not sure it is an entirely fool-proof guide to overall costs. But it certainly highlights an extraordinary situation in Turkey, where – relative to this country – prices in the survey have fallen by 37 per cent in the last year. This is because of a spectacular drop in the value of the Turkish currency caused by the local economic crisis. In March 2021 a pound would buy about 10 Lira, today it is worth nearly 20.

Whether that translates into a cheaper sun and sand holiday, however, depends on what sort of break you are looking for and how you book. Buy an all-inclusive deal – paid for in sterling in this country – and you may spend very little money while you are away. So what you pay will depend on the value offered by the tour operator and that in turn will depend on all sorts of factors, especially availability.

Out of interest, I looked at the cost of Tui’s Sensatori all-inclusive hotels in Fethiye, Rhodes and Majorca in the first half of August. Prices varied a lot according to departure date, but overall the Turkish hotel was typically around £1,400 for a week including flights, the one in Majorca between £1,400 and £1,800. Rhodes was the most expensive with one or two dates at £1,400 but lots more much higher and a top price of £2,100 for stays early in the month.

Those price differences very roughly echo the Post Office survey, but they don’t single out Turkey as quite the excellent value that you might think it would be. To really get the best value there, you would probably need to travel independently and pay for your hotel directly and make the most of the strong pound while you are out there. The key thing that you have to be wary of is the airfares. While prices on the ground are very low, the cost of getting to Turkey is often higher than to Greece, and certainly to Spain. Currently, return flights in August from London to Dalaman cost from £200, the Greek Islands from about £120 and the Balearics from about £80 for example.

But, even if you have to pay a bit more to get there, Turkey surely looks like a great call this year. Even putting value for money aside, I personally think it has more to offer than its neighbour and rival, Greece. Sure, you don’t get quite the sense of escape which some of the smaller Greek Islands offer, but the Turkish coastline is astonishingly beautiful, the archaeological sites are in a league of their own and the food – in my view – is better and much more varied. And when a meal out for two – complete with a bottle of the excellent local wine – costs just £16 in Marmaris compared with £48 in Corfu, well, I rest my suitcase.

For more inspiration, read Telegraph Travel's guide to the best hotels in the Turquoise Coast.