Backpacking Austin, whose name was apparently changed to Homeless in Austin, is a Pulp Travel story about hitchhiking into Austin, Texas with very little money.

For a hiker this was a very different urban camping experience.

Backpacking Austin was released in installments here on the blog, and is now available for free download in PDF format, Backpacking Austin PDF.

As always, the usual disclaimer's apply. Not only that, "This book describes the author's experiences while traveling and reflect his opinion relating to those experiences. Some names, trail names, and identifying details of individuals mentioned in the book have been changed to protect their privacy. Many of the characters have been combined from a variety people to simplify the overall narrative," but also the standard Pulp Travel disclaimer.

Unfortunately Backpacking Austin is a book that I never got to finish, which is why it seems to end in a strange sort of way, and a reason why I never published it anywhere. At that time in my life I was getting plenty enough bad reviews and hate mail from people calling me all sorts of vile and obnoxious things, and I wasn't about to add fuel to their fire by releasing this unfinished.

Sadly, the hate that I experienced unnecessarily prolonged my drinking phase and prevented me from being more productive.

What was left of the story are the people who took me in, and how they had been in Austin for years and yet had never seen any of the sights that I ended up seeing that week, like the Cathedral of Junk, the Texas State Capitol, nor had they yet taken a dip in the Barton Springs Municipal Pool.

The ultimate realization was that we don't have to travel to far off off places or spend a lot of money. Sometimes these things are right around the corner.

BackpackingAustin