The most exciting places you've ever been

Every year, I pick a place that was the most exciting place I'd been that year.  The criteria aren't that difficult for this decision:

1. I actually had gone there that year (go figure); and
2. I'd never been there before.

In 2006, for example, the most exciting place I went was Toronto, followed closely by Niagara Falls.  While I'd been in the Toronto airport on a couple of occasions many years ago, I'd never been in the city before.  Looking back at previous years, I get a list that looks something like this:

2005 - Albany, New York.  (I didn't get out much that year, thanks to biennial sessions of the Legislature.)
2004 - No award was given.  (I was finishing school and didn't go anywhere I'd never been before.)
2003 - Luxembourg City.  This was part of the trip to Europe made possible by $20 tickets from San Francisco to Frankfurt.  Amsterdam ran a close second on this one, and New York City was a close third.
2002 - Dallas.  We spent a couple of weeks on a road trip to Dublin, Texas, with the sole purpose of obtaining Dr Pepper.
2001 - Yosemite National Park.  I've lived no more than a few hours from it for most of my life, but I'd never been there until I was 27 years old.  Go figure.
2000 - Whistler, BC
1999 - The Mall of America in Minneapolis.  Meat Loaf was having a book signing that day.  (Second place goes to Charleston, West Virginia, which should tell just what kind of year it was.  No offense, of course, to those of you who live in West Virginia.)

The fact that many of these years have awfully boring exciting places notwithstanding, I bring this subject because the "winner" of this "award" back in 1998 - the very first Wendy's, located in downtown Columbus, Ohio - closed on Friday after nearly 40 years of operation.  I'd gone to a toy convention there for a day back that spring, and ended up going there for lunch because it was the only thing open in downtown Columbus on a Saturday afternoon.  (Or so it seemed.)

I'm not sure I really have a point to this whole thing, other than to say that -- for many years -- my life was awful sad if a fast-food restaurant was the most exciting place I went to all year.