Is my travel budget going to be realistic?

Does the $100 have to cover the cost of rooms? If so, you don't have enough budgeted.

How about a clue as to where you're going? A hundred bucks a day will do you fine for room and board in Perigueux. It won't be worth a toot in Oslo or Bern. The rail pass may not cover all of your transportation requirements. It will cost money to get into places.

If you are staying in hostels, that $100 is certainly enough. Many hostels are only 20 euro or so per night. Many also offer good deals on dinners too. Make lunch your main meal as in many cities, lunch specials are offered at a great reduced price. Go grocery shopping for extras, like snacks and dinners. Consider eating ethnic foods for dinner too, as they area often cheaper. You don't say where you are going, so that makes a huge difference. Switzerland will break you, but if you are spending a lot of time in Berlin, you will come out ahead, as it is quite cheap there. Walk as much as possible. Most hostels are in city centers, so sometimes you won't even need public transportation.

My hostel-stay days are long past, but a quick look on a couple of websites confirmed my thought that you should be able to manage fine on your budget. The general rule from my day is still the same: see the North but minimize the time there where it is usually more expensive than the South. About the money, don't carry it with you. I would put it in an account where you can access it as you need it via a debit card at ATM's. You get the best exchange rate that way. Capitol One had an account without transaction fees in the past, so check that out to see if it's still the case. You might check out Lonely Planet which is more geared to budget travel.

Since you already have the plane ticket and train pass, you just need to make it work. And I think you can do that with good advance research. Like others said, stick to less expensive countries (generally southern and eastern Europe), figure out museums' free days, find free events and festivals, make sure you know what your train pass covers so you don't get stuck paying extra fees, etc etc. I agree that browsing through more budget oriented guidebooks, like Lonely Planet, is a good idea, though double check any great info you find--LP are notorious for not being updated frequently. There is a column in the New York Times you can find online called the Frugal Traveler--look to see if there are any columns about places you want to visit.

Some other people made a good point that although your Eurail pass will help, it will not cover all fees. Many trains have a mandatory seat reservation fee that you must pay (but if you do it enough ahead of time it means that you will get a window seat which is important to me at least!) Hostels are generally pretty cheap so that will help, but keep in mind extra fees at the hostels as well, like your sheets and such. Going to grocery stores or markets and buying fruit to eat will help keep costs down, and you can pick up some bread, meat and cheese for sandwiches. Find someone at your hostel to buy it with you and share the cost. Will you be making your hostel reservations in advance? Since you will be there in June when more people start traveling around this might be a good idea to ensure you have somewhere to stay. It will take away some of your travel flexibility, so consider that, but it will give you the assurance you have somewhere to stay-somewhere cheap.

I would plan out all your hostels with that kind of tight budget. That way you'll know you'll have a roof over your head and what you can spend on food and entry fees. When I traveled in college, it seems like there were always a few people that went broke pretty fast. My roommate ran up his credit card pretty bad. Remember that it's EXPENSIVE over there!

ATTENTION....... J.D.!!!!! People are trying to help you here, but you need to toss out a bone or two. You're getting general advice which is pretty darn good. The thing is, there's a blue zillion people who have been everywhere you're thinking of going - - and been there a bunch of times. Unless you cough up some idea of locations, interests, etc, you have zip chance of getting specific, meaningful help.

Need additional information to make a reasonable reply....where are you going in particular will be beneficial...you may or may not be able to do it!!

I say yes and I have successful done it 8 yrs straight. Of course it does not include shopping, alcoholic beverages, fancy meals and Northern Europe as Sweden, Finland, Norway areas are xtra expensive. Congrats on saving enuf to have a great time.
Ask for student discounts wherever you go and have student id to prove it.

Ok, so the comments I've gotten so far are great and have helped me a lot in planning to budget as well as save more within the next few months. Here is a little more information to help make my plans a little more specific. Trip duration : May 16-June 27 I will fly into London with a friend of mine on the 16th. We will stay 2 days in London (where we will have to find hostels or split a cheap hotel) and then we will be staying for free in Bath with some of her cousins the remainder of the trip. They are driving us from London to Bath and back again for her flight back to the US on May 23. Basically, my first week will include 2 days worth of hostels/hotels, basic food, and travel costs via bus or train in London. Past my first week I have no idea what I am going to do and where I am going to go. I know that I would like to see Amsterdam, Paris, Berlin, Spain, Portugal and Prague. I read that it will cost about $30 extra to cross into Prague since it isn't covered by my Eurail Global Pass. Does anyone have any ideas on what type of itinerary might be best for me? Since I've purchased this pass and it covers such a broad area I'd like to get a taste for as much as possible. I'm a little worried about the individual booking fees that I will have to have for certain trains but I read that they're relatively inexpensive, around $10 give or take? Thanks - JD

My boyfriend and I stayed exclusively at hostels for our trip this past fall. Excluding airfare to/from Europe, and trains/airfare between cities, we spent about $1400 on our entire 17-day trip. To echo others' comments about your destination dictating your budget generally, your dollar will go a longer way the further east and south you go. Our cities were a mix of more expensive (Brussels/Amsterdam/Munich) and cheaper (Berlin/Prague/Budapest). We stayed in rooms of 4-8 beds, and the most expensive being Brussels at about $35/night (the Euro was around $1.40 at the time), and the cheapest being Budapest at around $15/night (~220Ft to the dollar). Middle ground was probably Berlin, with $24/night. For in-city transportation, check if your hostels offer any passes. Most of our hostels rented out transit day passes for around 4EUR. Most of our hostels offered breakfast buffets, all-you-can-eat for around 5EUR. If there was no buffet, we grabbed coffee and a pastry elsewhere. It wasn't really on purpose, but we usually ended up not eating until dinner (all that walking around), which was usually bread-meat-cheese & fruit from the grocery store or some kind of street food. We only ate at a couple of restaurants, in Prague and Budapest. A lot of our "food" budget was also spent on beer, and this can also be obtained cheaply at your hostel most of our hostels had a cool bar or at least sold beer, all for cheap. Anyway, sorry I wrote a whole novel here. PM me with questions if you want.

Where are you flying home from? Spain and Portugal go well together. UK, France and Netherlands fit well too. Prague is a little out of the way by rail if you aren't planning on stopping in Germany. The big question is whether you need to design a big circle back to London (or plan to fly back there on a budget airline). If you took Prague off the table, you could leave London by ferry to the Netherlands. From there head south to Paris, then on to Spain and end in Portugal.

Well, now that you've finally fessed up to what you're thinking, I think you can probably pull it off. Paris can bite you in the butt, but doesn't have to. Barcelona, maybe, food will be okay, but I've never broken the code there for places to stay - - try for a hostal if you can't find a hostel (they're different). Once you're out of the UK, things will cheapen up. I'm guessing that you're going to wander, so don't plan things out (or make reservations) ahead of time. You're going to get the best scoop on how to get along in a place from the other folks in the hostels. These same people will influence where you decide to go next - - some might even travel along for a while - - hence not making reservations. You probably won't see everything you expect to, but you'll see gobs that you have no idea exist. Don't sweat it. If you had an extra five hundred bucks in you hip pocket just in case, you'd probably feel a bit more comfortable. My solo trips in Europe seem to run about a hundred and fifty bucks a day (including fifty bucks for a car and gas - - your transportation is pretty much covered aready). The differences are that I stay out of the big cities, but I also toss twenty-five bucks at supper most nights. I also buy a couple of coffees and a couple of beers during the course of the day. Breakfast and lunch are out of a grocery sack in the back of the car - - I save street/stall food for the Middle East and Asia. Have at it.