4 week trip? Young couple avoiding big cities

Errrr......3700 divided by 30 is 123.3. Which is for the couple. If it's per person, I'm like Lee and have never spent that much is my life. We figure about 80 per person and that includes all internal transportation.

Other options are: From Poland, head through your desired towns in Czech, Salzburg Austria, Lake Bled Slovenia, then into Croatia. Pula or down the coast to Split, Dubrovnik and other towns. 4 weeks is plenty of time to visit all these places. There's a beautiful gorge walk by Lake Bled, the Vintgar gorge. Lake Bled is a small town with a cute castle and other nice hikes. I mention Salzburg because you'd pass right by it and it's a great, even if it is a city. Croatia is still relatively cheap compared to the rest of Europe, although some of the main towns that are visited frequently by cruise ships are getting more expensive, yet cheap compared to other parts of Europe.

P.S. 3700 Euros is to cover all costs over there and doesn't include flights

First things first: you've got a pretty tight monetary limit. A hundred and twenty-five euro per day is really on the short end of what is possible. Austria and Switzerland are really steep and I'll just leave them out of the discussion. Eastern Europe and the Iberian peninsula are the least expensive areas. Even there, you're looking at about fourty euro per night to sleep and maybe a little less for food - - call it seventy-five. With what's left you have to rent bikes, mules, pay entry fees, etc. There will probably be a bit left over. HOWEVER, what's left won't cover the transportation costs to get from point to point. You're scattered all over the map. Dordogne to Krakow is about as far as it is from Brisbane to Adelaide. A method of attack might be to first, figure out the transportation costs between points, then start eliminating places until your balance will cover the other costs.

Have you used the Lonely Planet website? Their Thorntree forums are geared more to the type of trip you describe so you are more likely to find contributors who have "been there, done that."

you should seriously consider the area around Monte Perdido and Ordesa in northern Spain

Have you considered Plzen, Czech Republic. We trained from Krakow through Prague where we changed trains and went on to Plzen. That is where pilsner beer began and a tour of the brewery was interesting. The compact old town was very interesting. I can give you a good hotel name and directions to it from the train station if you like.

The Berner Oberland and the Dordogne are outstanding destinations. In 4 weeks I would cover a lot of ground if I could, mixing short visits with one or two week-long stays. How many might depend on how efficiently I could string things together, avoiding zig zags and long hops. Your big constraint is money. You can sometimes save by renting; rentals are usually available on a weekly basis. Trains cost money so traveling less can save too. Cheaper destinations tend to be east. Have you considered Slovakia, Croatia? Rural destinations need wheels which can be expensive (if a car) or weather-dependent (if bicycles). I could imagine four great weeks beginning in the Dordogne with a slow sweep though Languedoc and Provence, up the Rhone valley and over the the BO. Not cheap, though, although there would be ways to do it cheaper than otherwise.

"A hundred and twenty-five euro per day is really on the short end of what is possible." Maybe it is for the way most people travel, but I don't know how I would manage to spend €125/day. In my last 4 trips to German/Austria (52 nights), traveling alone, I have averaged under €72/day. Admittedly, my travel has been somewhat confined, but room and board expenses were probably more than what you could expect in Eastern Europe. My expenses breaks down as: Overnight + breakfast, 44%; Other meals, bev, tips, 27%; Transportation, 21%;
Misc, admissions, 7%. On a €125/day budget, that gives you €34 each for food, €110 for both of you for a room, and €26 each for transportation. Outside of big cities, I can't imagine spending €34/p/day for food. A double room in most of those countries should be less than €110/day. €26/day gives you about €960 (plus what you don't spend on room and board) for transportation for your trip. As Ed suggests, make an itinerary and carefully price out travel costs. Unless you are youths, you probably don't have enough for a rail pass for all of your travel (and Poland isn't included in Eurail), but you might make it pay for some of your travel. In order to keep accommodation expenses at a minimum, you need to make an itinerary and plan carefully. Booking through booking website will probably cost more than just blowing into town and asking the tourist info office what's available for cheap, but I've found that using town website is more economical than using TIs. Two things to remember: 1) TIs are trying to spread bookings around, not minimize your expenses. There is no guarantee that they find the least expensive place for you. 2) Lots of people are using town website for their accommodations and they'll take the best, least expensive places. You'll get what's left.

250 a day for a couple is not all that tight. For wonderful hiking, biking, and horseback riding, you should consider the Dolomites in Italy. I've seen people riding the Haflinger horses up on Alpe di Siusi and want to go back to do that: http://www.seiser-alm.it/en/leisure-activities/horse-riding/ You can even stay at a mountain horsefarm, although I don't know if their horses are available for riding: www.zallinger.com Double room with half-board (breakfast and dinner) is 120 to 125 a night for two. This area is very active-sports oriented as well as beautiful. You could easily spend a week there. It is a short trip from Austria, just over the Italy/Austria border.

I can see that you already did some homework. Not too many people know about Blansko. To stay comfortably within your budget I would eliminate all western Europe and do caves around Blansko, northern Hungary and Auschwitz with Wieliczka salt mines. These locations are at least twice cheaper than locations in western Europe. Around Blansko there is a beautiful hilly countryside, good for hiking and biking and a lot of caves. The most popular are Punkva caves with an underground lake and river. In summer I would recommend to buy tickets for Punkva caves few days ahead. In nearby Boskovice there is a western town like from Wild West. You can get there on bicycle. Northern Hungary (east of Danube) has also caves, thermal swimming pools and vineyards with wineries. You can kill a lot of birds with one stone there. It's also hilly there, good for hiking and biking. And in 4 weeks you will also have time for Krakow, Auschwitz and Wieliczka.

I just did a bit of checking and in 2010 our family traveled over some of the same territory you listed and (excluding airfare) spent 200Euro/day. That's all of us - two adults and three children then between 7 and 14 years old. That same trip also included a bunch of cities (which tend to be more expensive than rural), so YOU WILL BE FINE on your budget. If you are interested in keeping things thrifty, you could even spend quite a bit less. Yes, Germany and points east are cheaper than places farther west and south, but that doesn't mean you have to exclude those places from your list. We have found rural France, for example, to be very affordable. With four weeks to work with, you could cover a large area. Frankly, you could, in theory, connect two very separate areas of Europe with a cheap flight or a long night train ride, if you find yourselves torn between, say, the Dordogne and Poland. You could still do both. Consider flying open-jaw to avoid having to return to your point of origin to get home. On our trip in 2010 we were there for 5 weeks and slept in 12 different locations from Amsterdam to Krakow & Budapest. (In Krakow, consider "Greg and Toms" hostel. For about $20/person you get a bed, free food every meal, free wifi and free use of their washing machine for laundry)

Thanks for all the help. We'll definitely cut down the places so we're based in one area like you guys have suggested. The advice on accommodation has very helpful. The budget is 3700 Euro each so we should be able to work off a budget similar to Lee's. Some of the Eastern European places sound amazing so I think we will stay in these areas so we can make the most of our budget based off these replies and we will leave the expensive countries for a later trip. Honestly you have all been so helpful and we will definitely be checking out these options.

Ack! I missed 'each'. You've got no problems at all.

FWIW, I really like Kathy's general plan. If you have the time to spare, you could probably stretch it to 5 weeks on the same budget if you kept most things in the cheaper countries and more rural than city. I love the Aussie tendancy to travel slow. A typical American newer traveler to Europe would want to do everything on your list in 10 days and want to know if there was still time to see Greece, too. :) We flew home from Brisbane last July but only got to be in the city for part of a day. It looked like a great place to live - vibrant. We loved all our time in Australia, but Ululru, the Olgas, Kings Canyon and the area around Alice Springs - all in the centre, the most. You will have a great time! Congratulations.