THE LIGHT IN FRONT

You wouldn’t believe it, but Albany was actually pretty fucking awesome.

A lot of it had to do with my hosts there, Alan and Jim, who besides going to all lengths to make my stay there a fun one, played an excellent and very succesful game of smoke and mirrors in order to make Albany seem interesting. So I can at least say Albany’s worth a visit, but only if you know Alan and Jim.

They didn’t waste any time as soon as I got there. For starters, Alan had made me three (3) CD’s of awesome music for my roadtrip. I think only two people have bothered to send me good roadtrip music after my call to action earlier, so shame on you guys. The dudes from Albany are cooler than all of you. I’ll let you think about that for a minute.

Secondly, I was handed DAS BOOT and immediately whisked away to a Beer Garden to fill it up and promptly empty it. Let me tell you folks, DAS BOOT is not something to be fucked with.

I can’t remember for the life of me what I filled it with, but it was dark and strong (8-9% alcohol) and awesome, and it gave me a pretty decent wallop. I would have had another one and gotten pretty damn hammered, but it was getting late, the place was emptying out, and I was still in the rush mode of staying just one night and moving on, so I had to take it easy lest I miss an opportunity to grab a good camping spot on my next stop, Ithaca.

Next morning I did my whole wake-up-too-late schtick, this time with a mild hangover, and had my portrait taken with the Superyaris by Alan, who is a pretty fucking sick photographer. He busted out this ancient looking camera, the kind you hide under a little black blanket to take a picture with, and snapped the flick. That’ll take a few days to get developed, so I don’t think we’ll get to see it until after my trip is over. I’m confident it kicks ass though.

I was about to head off to Ithaca but was convinced to have lunch (hard to say no to Indian food) and take a tour of the Capitol and the surrounding area, Empire State Plaza. I was definitely not expecting to be awed the way I was by it.

The place was designed by Oscar Niemeyer, an architect best known for designing the city of Brasilia in Brazil, which is easily one of the craziest looking places on earth:

Empire State Plaza was not much different. It was pretty rainy, so I didn’t catch many flicks:

And here’s some much better images that are not mine:

That crazy thing in the middle is a performing arts center, and is actually called The Egg. There’s a huge series of tunnels and interconnected offices underneath the whole thing, with old school elevators, incredible cast-iron gates, and epic stairwells. It was all very strange and interesting, I’m pretty certain I’ve never been in a place quite like that, and I’m glad I stuck around to see it.

I eventually took off pretty late to Ithaca, without having a clear idea of where I was gonna camp out at. Research revealed 3 major campsites near the town, and a call to my friend David helped reveal the obvious choice: Taughannock Falls. Thankfully, I made it there before sundown and there were still plenty of spots available… but that’s a matter left to the next post.