Like many of his generation, Bill Bryson backpacked across Europe in the early '70s - in search of enlightenment, beer, and women. Over 20 years later, the acclaimed author of Notes from a Small Island, The Mother Tongue, and A Walk in the Woods decided to retrace the journey he undertook in the halcyon days of his youth, carrying with him a bag of maps, old clothes, and a stinging wit honed to razor sharpness by 2 decades of adult experience. The result is this affectionate, blisteringly insightful, and riotously funny pilgrimage from the frozen wastes of Scandinavia to the chaotic tumult of Istanbul, with stops along the way in Europe's most diverting and historic locales.