Experience the best of Albany

Albany stands on the west bank of the Hudson River, where it began in the 1620s as a Dutch fur-trading post called Fort Orange, and it received a city charter in 1686, one of the oldest in the country. The New York State Capitol, finished in 1899 after three decades of work, is a heavily carved building in a mix of styles with an ornate stone staircase. Below it, the Empire State Plaza, a complex of white marble towers and an egg-shaped performing arts hall from the 1960s and 1970s, is a very different statement.

The New York State Museum stands in the plaza, the Albany Institute of History and Art is nearby, and the Schuyler Mansion is where Alexander Hamilton married Elizabeth Schuyler in 1780. Washington Park fills with tulips in May, a Dutch tradition, and the Albany Pine Bush Preserve protects an inland pine barrens home to the rare Karner blue butterfly. The Catskills, Berkshires and Adirondacks all rise within a day's reach.

The Hudson Valley supplies apples, cider doughnuts and craft beer, and Lark Street, with its cafés and small shops, is the bohemian corner of town. Autumn colour is strong along the river, and winters bring reliable snow.