Help me plan my first trip to Europe!

Plan on doing laundry - you can even drop most of your stuff off at a fluff/fold place in a mall in larger cities and pick it up the next day. If you have one of those giant backpacks, prepare for it to not fit into lockers, train compartments, and other places you will be.

If you are the kind of traveler who collects lots of paper, you might want to bring some kind of folder or plastic binder along. It could also be where you keep copies of your itinerary and tickets. I usually have two, one for papers I won't need again until the trip is over and one for things that are coming up. On my last trip, I ripped out only the pages I needed from the guidebook, taped them together and stuck them in the folder. I'm another one who brings 3-4 sizes of ziplocs along, from tiny to huge. They take up very little room and weigh nothing, but they are so handy.

You are not traveling to the wilds of PNG. You are traveling to western europe! Anything you that, upon arrival, you realize has been forgotten, can be easily and inexpensively bought. The sarong, as mentioned above, is the greatest thing known to man. It's a beach towel, bath towel, sun shade, tablecloth, pillowcase, gunnysack, and unisex multifunction garment all in one. It may mean some interesting charades with a pharmacist in Genoa Oh, to have a video of the time my friend Jez caught VD from some random tourist hookup and was forced to do a spastic hand-claw-clasping crabdance in the farmàcia when his repeated cries of "cangrejos!" had no effect other than amused confusion.

I also always take an eyemask and earplus - dorms/hotel rooms are always light and noisey so these help. Also great if you are trying to sleep on trains or buses. And oddly - little post it notes are really useful. If you have a guidebook with lots of different maps of cities etc on different pages - I found tagging the pages I was using all the time made it much easier than always flicking through the book to find the page I wanted.

One extra you might not have thought of: Sunglasses You'll be outside a lot!

you should also pack a few ziplocs, which are incidentally great places for your socks or whatever. when your toothpaste explodes or you buy too much cheese you'll be happy.

accidentally slicing your foot on some mystery piece of glass on the hostel floor. But of course you are bringing flip-flops for showers and such... You know what? You're going to be in situations where you don't have the perfect tool and won't be able to fix it like you would at home. You know what else? You'll be totally fine. In the end, this. I do have some advice, however: Get in the habit of packing your things a certain way and always pack that way. It will be quicker and easier to see if you've forgotten something. The bonus for travelling light, ie 3 shirts instead of 5, is that it will be instantly obvious when one is missing. Even more important, when you are buying tickets, changing money, going through immigration, etc before you move on to the next thing, stop and take the time to put everything away where you normally carry it. It's when you shove things into your pocket and are on the next thing in your mind/on your list before you've properly finished the first thing that mistakes happen.

1) A bandana-- for eating outdoors fancily and practically (lay out the bread, cheese, tomato, etc. that you just bought at an outdoor market or even supermarket...this will save you lots of money as well, while feeling festive at the same time.) Or for anything else you need a piece of fabric for. I used mine constantly (sadly it's been so long that I can't remember more examples...sigh!) Maybe bring two...they weigh nothing. 2) If you have a sarong (thin piece of fabric, typically used as a skirt), take that instead of a towel. They are extremely light, dry incredibly quickly, and can be used for a million things. Plus, it is easy to wash in a sink, and then wring out and tie to the outside of your pack. Take it the beach, tie it into a bag to carry other objects, use it to wear over your bathing suit, etc. (Maybe bring two...again, they weight nothing, and squash down to nothing.) A towel is a ridiculous object to cart around when you are travelling like this. 3) Seriously, pack as lightly as humanly possible. Backpacks are often huge! Definitely don't fill it up. There's just no reason to. Or if at some point you realize that you have taken too much, consider just popping into a post office and mailing a bunch of stuff back home (if you have the money of course.) Backpacking is just so much more fun when you are not weighed down like a pack mule and don't always have to plan ways to immediately jettison your pack as soon as you get to a new town. You can be more spontaneous. Have fun!

I always find these threads funny. Everyone says 'pack light, but this is quite handy...' and if you followed everyone's advice, you'd have a towel and a knife and a clothesline and talcum powder and a portable pharmacy and a compass and a sleep sack and two different padlocks and so on. You know what? You're going to be in situations where you don't have the perfect tool and won't be able to fix it like you would at home. You know what else? You'll be totally fine. It may mean some interesting charades with a pharmacist in Genoa, or improvising a clothesline out of an extension cord and two bunk beds, but you'll get it done. I'd say worry less about what you're packing and just accept that part of the joy of backpacking lies in the fact that you have (at least temporarily) abandoned the comforts and the confines of everyday life. The price of exploring the world may be a damp towel or an improvised knife. And that's fine.