Rather than haul a laptop, I'm considering taking a cruzer smart flash with me and using it from internet cafe's. If you have some experience with this, please advise the wisdom of doing this?
Ive taken a USB device as well - and also my IPOD video as a large HD to transfer picts from cam. It works fine if there is access to the back of the pc - like in a casual PC terminal of a hotel - but some places may not have access to the box - just Keyboard/mouse/screen with the box locked up. But you could also always ask for asistance... just make sure you dont have any important docs on that stick you hand over for help with any trasfer (as I also like to have scans of some travel docs).
When I don't take my mini eee PC around, or I have no access to open wireless networks, I use a USB flash disk in internet cafes.
Go to www.portableapps.com - easily download and install all the apps you want or think you need including Firefox web browser, Thunderbird email client, instant messengers, OpenOffice or AbiWord for office documents and a bunch of others. They've even compiled the most common apps into a single download.
Installs in a snap so all the browser history, passwords, documents, etc are never left behind when you leave the internet cafe.
Be advised that internet cafes are becoming increasingly scarce in Europe as the price of laptops and broadband has fallen. In fact a lot of ICs now cater to online video games, instead of web surfing. I use a high-end PDA in my travels.