what is the best way to travel europe on a budget?

stay in youth hostels. they are very cheap and they give you a free breakfast to boot!!

not sure if it still exists but years ago I used this service called airhitch to travel to europe for $169 each way.also icelandair used to have one of the cheapest airfares.

yes hostels. Call or reserve in advance cause they do fill up. Sorry I cant answer more.

So this is what my best friend and I did while we were in Europe...

We made sure that we had friends everywhere we went. That way, we were able to crash into their places. But make sure ur responsible and respect their homes and $#!T like that. On top of that, we were pretty frugal on food. We ate sufficiently, but did not go to the fancy schmancy places.

Public transportation is the best way to go especially in the big cities such as Paris and London. If you look at the ticket options, there are some things that you can buy where the rates are pretty reasonable.

For drinks, we made sure that we found some male booty to buy us drinks.... Since we were two girls, we were able to do this easily... ;) Oh, and also, get to the clubs early... Most of the clubs do not have a cover price until 11pm (especially in London).

Hostels do help, but there are a lot of people out there who are willing to do time share that can be a bit more reasonable than hostels.

Touring the cities is not all that expensive. Stuff like museums and parks are mostly free.

Enjoy or stay there. It was one of the best vacations of my life!

You might check out Rick Steves. He writes books about budget travel in Europe that are very helpful. Let's Go books are also good. They are written for and sometimes by students. Hostels are the best in many situations but we have also found that there are B&Bs that are even better. Depends on the country/area. We've never tried, but camping is another way to save. Just getting there is usually the greatest expense.

I travel with a tent, a pot for cooking and dried food (soups and canned food), though i`ve never done that in europe (is there much camping available there?) I`ve been to some hostels that let you set up a tent in the back yard or on the balcony for a bit cheaper than staying in a bed(but it might need to be a free standing tent).
also i`ve used these two sites before to contact people to crash at their places. awesome sites & i`ve been recommending them to every traveler i meet. not only can you meet new people, you get to immerse yourself in local culture as well!
www.hospitalityclub.org
www.couchsurfing.com
Also wwoof.org is a site dedicated to managing an online organic farming community. for a fee (usually u$s30) you can order a list of farms in desired countries where you can sleep and eat in exchange for manual labour. labour varies depending on the farm. you get to see lots more of the country side this way, but you will need lots moretime in europe to do this.
check em out!!

Get the cheapest airfare you can to mainland Europe (Germany or France) and then get a EurRail flexplass to see all of Europe by train.

Horse Back.