Monday, July 10, 2006

Albany

Last month, we got our first look at our new home, Albany, NY. In order to use our hard-earned ticket vouchers, we had to fly into LaGuardia rather than Albany. So we spent our first night in Queens, picked up the rental car the next day, and headed north along the Hudson.

Traffic heading out of the city wasn’t too bad and once we got across the Whitestone Bridge, the scenery quickly changed from urban to rustic. After living in Nebraska for so long, I think we were both excited to see so many trees and mountains. We passed through several small towns that could’ve easily been nestled in rural Vermont or New Hampshire. After stopping for breakfast at the CIA (Culinary Institute Of America). The campus, which is nestled just off the Hudson, is lush, green, and beautiful. Of course, the appearance of the campus couldn’t compare to the smells of French, Italian, and American cuisine that centered around the CIA’s five restaurants. We grabbed a croissant, a scone, and freshly squeezed OJ at the bakery before heading north again along the east side of the Hudson.

Along the way, we stopped at the Vanderbilt Mansion. We didn’t go inside, but had some fun exploring the property. The Hudson is beautiful north of NYC. This picture was shot from the Vanderbilt’s backyeard.

We approached Albany from the east and weren’t too impressed with the neighborhoods near the river. As we got up the hill and away from the river, however, the city began to improve. We parked the car and explored the Center Square neighborhood around Lark Street. The area has plenty of well-kept brownstones and Lark St. is a popular college hangout filled with small shops and bars.

After exploring the city a bit more and grabbing a bite to eat at a local pizzeria, we explored the Empire State Plaza.

The performing arts center, known as The Egg, is the most unique structure in the plaza.

Here's another view of the Egg and the plaza from the observation deck of the Corning Building.


We started the next day with a tour of Albany Law School. We spoke to Gail Benson, Director Of Admissions, and got a nice tour of the campus including both the 1928 building and the 2000 building. The buildings had a nice mix of modern and classical architecture and I think we both liked the feel of the school, which was a relief considering we had already made a commitment to attend.

After our tour the apartment search oficially began. Our plan was to walk through Center Square and call on any For Rent signs we found. Unfortunately, it rained the entire day making it difficult to talk on the phone, take notes, and stay dry at the same time.

Apartment hunting is never fun and it was even less fun in Albany. Few landlords we contacted returned our call. When we were able to schedule an appointment to view an apartment, it seems like we either didn’t like the neighborhood, the apartment, the landlord, or all of the above. One apartment rented by an old Italian couple stands out for in particular. The husband wasn’t home to show the apartment, so his wife, who spoke broken english, attempted to let us in. She claimed the front door to the basement apartment was stuck and asked me to open it. Turns out the door wasn’t so much stuck as locked, so she took us around to the back door. We continued walking through an unfinished basement and eventually got to the apartment. Even if we liked the look of the apartment, we couldn't have gotten by the dank, dusty, smell. I unlocked the front door to let us out and we practically ran back to the car.

The downtown apartments that we did like didn’t stay empty very long. We found an apartment on Madison Ave near Washington Park that we loved. We talked it over on the ride back to the motel and called the landlord 20-minutes after seeing the apartment. He never called us back. We found another apartment right off Washington Park that we loved. Unfortunately, someone was already looking at it when we came in and he took the place before we even had a chance.

After the frustration of dealing with landlords, we decided it was time to look at a few apartment complexes to use as last resorts and vowed to continue searching once we got back to Lincoln.

We had fun with the rest of trip. We explored the Adirondacks, the Catskills, and we still got to spend almost three days in the city.

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