The Selby/Trunk Archive  THE FALL AFTER I graduated from
college, with few obligations or opportunities to keep me
stateside, my then-girlfriend and I decided to burn through our
savings with a seven-week-long backpacking trip through Europe.
Jack Kerouac I was not. Despite the freewheeling nature of my
life—no apartment, real job or sense of my future—I was a
fastidious planner when it came to traveling. I liked to know
when I would be where, how I'd get from point A to B, and so on.
Perhaps I was compensating for my otherwise rudderless
existence.  Because I'm also an inveterate saver of computer
files, I still have my carefully mapped-out itinerary for the
trip, and thus can tell you with certainty that this story took
place on Nov. 12, 2001. We were wrapping up a four-day stay in
Vienna. My records inform me that our next location was
Salzburg, then a $35 train ride away (now $88).  Having lost our
taste for grungy youth hostels, we had rented an apartment for
our visit, during which we sampled Vienna's