compass (Score 1)

In all my backpacking through Europe, I'd say the most valuable piece of technology I had was my good old fashioned compass. Its important to be able to exit a train station and immediately orient yourself. Say you know the river is south of the train station and your hostel is located along the river near some famous bridge, its a piece of cake to find with just a compass. And don't take the laptop. Internet cafes are everywhere, but I WOULD take a nice big USB key and make sure you have some dump space somewhere on the internet to stick pictures or anything else. A skype account is also useful to call all your peoples back home.