European Backpacking
 

We (Two 18 year olds and one 17 year old) were planning to backpack across Europe during the summer of 2016 for 30 days. We have a number of cities we would like to visit, including:
London
Paris
Amsterdam
Berlin
Prague
Venice
Lucerne
Nice
Barcelona

Is it realistic to expect to visit all of these cities?
If not, which cities do you recommend cutting? Is there a specific route you would reccomend? Should we purchase a Eurail pass?

Thanks!

One more thing:
We would all be traveling on a budget of 3000-4000. We would also have free accommodation in Amsterdam and Berlin, because one of us has family there.

Assume you mean $3/$4K EACH - not all together. And does this include airfare - which will probably be $1K or more?

If you do mean $4k for all 3 people I'm afraid that's just not enough. Fifty euros per person is considered a sort of backpacker drop dead minimum - which would be $1700 per person (LOTS of walking, picnics from supermarkets and very basic hostels) plus airfare and long distance trains.

As for 9 cities in 30 days - this is VERY rushed and will give you only a brief taste of each place. If I had to drop it would be Barcelona and possibly Nice - but you really need to research and see which cities are YOUR must dos.

Yes, I meant $3000-$4000 EACH, not including airfare. Is this budget realistic? Also, if we cut Venice, it would be:
London
Paris
Amsterdam
Berlin
Prague
Lucerne
Nice
Barcleona
Is that more realistic?

Even 8 locations in 30 days is a lot. Unless your idea of this trip is viewing the insides of trains and train stations, airports and budget airlines, cut another couple of destinations.

Every time you change locations you lose between half a day (rare) and most of a day (more common). You have to figure the time from checking out of your hostel in one city until you are checked into the hostel in the next. Thus, if you have three nights in a place, you have just two sightseeing days. If you have 30 nights on the ground, I'd aim for 6 destinations, 5 nights each, giving you 4 sightseeing days in each city.

Take a care full look at each of these cities. Which ones really call to you? Which ones make your travel more complicated or more expensive? Lucerne, for instance is a very expensive city.