I was at a hostel in Dublin in the summer of 1986 with my best friend, Dave. We met a guy from Italy. Most of the hostelers were in our age group, late teens to early twenties. This guy was clearly in his late twenties. He was nice and interesting, as he had been traveling for three years--all over the world. Not sure what his job was before that, but he knew a lot about travel.

Anyhoo, we were telling him we were headed to southern Italy next. A big smile came over his face. We asked what that was all about and he just said: "Corfu. You guys HAVE to go to Corfu. Take the ferry from Brindisi. It will be awesome!"

We were not planning on Greece. But we went to Corfu, cuz the Travel Guy said to. It was spectacular. Breathtaking. I still to this day have a vivid memory of maybe a hundred young people all lying down, right next to each other, on their sleeping bags under the stars and moon on the top deck of the massive ferry taking us across the water to Greece. It was and is one of those very few moments in life that is truly magical. I'll never forget it.