ALBANY - There is no getting around it, New York's governor is spending a great deal of time elsewhere.

On Friday, George Pataki returned from his latest foray, a six-day adventure that took him to New Hampshire, Iowa, Illinois and California. In fact, in the 46 days since he flew to Iowa on Sept. 13 to begin a two-day visit there and returned Friday from his latest sojourn, the Republican governor has spent 19 days outside New York.

That's more than 40 percent of his time.

It's not that other New York governors haven't traveled. Democrat Mario Cuomo once famously flew to Buenos Aires to give a speech. Of course, he flew back to New York from Argentina the very same day.

Pataki, on the other hand, is lingering. He is also eyeing a possible run for president in 2008.

Besides his domestic travels, Pataki recently spent a week in China on a “trade mission” and several days in Finland as the guest of U.S. Ambassador Earle Mack, a New York City-area developer and financial supporter of the governor's past campaign efforts.

In a previously unannounced sidetrip, Mack and Pataki flew next door to Russia, where they had meetings with U.S. Ambassador William Burns and with Moscow Mayor Yuri Luhzkov, Pataki spokesman David Catalfamo said.

The three-country jaunt appeared designed to boost the New York governor's rather thin foreign policy credentials.

Cuomo made a one-week trip to Russia in 1987 when he was first eyeing a possible presidential run.

Pataki is also hitting the right places domestically if he really does want to run for president.

Iowa and New Hampshire, of course, host the traditional kickoff contests in the presidential nominating process while California, along with New York, represents the piggy bank for candidates seeking national office. Pataki held multiple fund-raisers this past week in the Golden State for the Virginia-based political action committee he uses to finance his national activity. On his way from California to Iowa, he stopped in Chicago for another fund-raiser to benefit that 21st Century Freedom PAC.

Pataki, in the face of record-low job approval ratings early this year, announced July 27 he would not seek a fourth, four-year term in 2006.

“I guess when you're as unpopular in your home state as George Pataki is, you want to be in it as seldom as possible,” said Blake Zeff, a Democratic Party spokesman.

Nonetheless, unless he quits early, Pataki will be governor of New York for another 13 months, collecting his $179,000-a-year salary and serving as the chief executive of a state government that spends more than $100 billion a year.

Given that, Blake said the governor might want to reconsider his travels.

“George Pataki should heed his own taxpayer-funded tourism commercials and pay a visit to New York every once in a while,” the Democratic Party spokesman said.

Pataki aides maintain the governor is in constant touch with his office when he is on the road, able to handle state affairs just fine. He is not about to become a stay-at-home governor, they say.

“The governor is committed to having a voice in the national debate and will continue to travel the country to support the candidates and the ideas that will move our state and nation forward,” Catalfamo said Thursday.

Pataki, during a video conference from China, said that trip wasn't about boosting his foreign policy credentials, but “about New York.”

The governor said representatives from about a dozen New York companies who accompanied him on the trade mission had “over 300 individual one-on-one meetings” with Chinese officials about expanding trade.

On Monday, as Pataki began his California visit, Catalfamo had said the six-day trip “allows the governor to talk about the issues that are important to the future of the Republican Party and to support the candidates and ideas that he thinks are important.”