Had a year off traveling. First lot of interviews after that, everyone was very suspicious - e.g. wondering if the plan was to work for a few months then take off again. Fast forward two years when interviewing again everyone thought it was a "fantastic life experience". Basically employers saw it as a risk first time around, second time around it was proven that my intentions were good. YMMV.
"and what is/was the response to the 'sabbatical year' on your résumé?"
I'm not sure. I don't actively mail around my résumé, since I'm employed at the moment and not looking for work. Sometimes recruiters email me, but they have never mentioned the sabbatical. Probably people just ignore it. I haven't updated the details on my résumé since 2004, shame on me ;-)
FWIW, I've been "out of work" for ~2.5 years, traveled SE Asia, lived in Japan for six months, and bicycled from Canada to Mexico. When a Google recruiter talked to me, he seemed really impressed, and not put off in the least.
You get it, as long as you have a legitimate story and reason people who you would actually want to work for wouldn't care or even be envious. However, if you just sat around the house, went out drinking with your buddies all the time, and lived off savings - that could look bad to most people (not all, but most).