O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!
This song has come to mind quite often over the past 10 days, especially on July 4th. Hubby and I left home on June 25th, dropped our Catahoula puppy off at the boarding place (or should I say dog resort! http://www.lonestardogranch.com), and headed across the plains of West Texas on a research trip. We did two research trips last year–one to the Blue Ridge Parkway to do research for a book I’ve been working on and the Smoky Mountains to do research for another–and the other to New York, Maine, and Boston for a children’s book I have planned.
This year we’re doing research for the sequel to Superstition and for a possible photo book. We’ve been to the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, the Superstition mountains in Arizona, made a quick stop in Los Angeles to see the boys, and headed up the 1 (Pacific Coast Highway). We drove all the way to Seattle (more Superstition research), and back down to Yosemite. For the next week we’ll be camping out, taking pictures, and writing.
On my bucket list is to visit every state in this beautiful country of ours. I’ve now been from Seattle, WA to Naples, Florida and from San Diego CA to Maine. I’ve seen at least part of 39 states, including Hawaii. I’m hoping to complete that list next year with a visit to Alaska and the remaining 1o states. I have an idea for a series with each book set in a different state. It’s an ambitious project, but one I hope I can do someday.
Do you have a bucket list? What’s the number one thing on it?
Authors of Main Street 
Beautiful photos. Travel is the best research for writing. Wish I were there with you! Enjoy the rest of your trip.
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Travel is definitely on my wish list, but it’s not realistic right now. I would love to do research trips.
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Sounds like you’re having a great time and getting lots of inspiration and information for your books. My bucket list includes travel too, starting here in the U.S.A. My husband and I hope to head out soon with Yellowstone as one of our first destinations.
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I’m just a little green around the edges. I will deny being responsible for the big green glow that you are seeing to your east.
Hubby and I used to jump in the car and just go. We’d take a road to see where it led us. No GPS, just a good road map. I few times we wound up in West Virginia or another neighboring state, but we always had fun. We had planned to go westward and not by using the superslabs but just little roads. We wanted to see where we were going.
No real bucket list, just wanderlust. 🙂
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Oh, a photojournalist vacation. Sounds wonderful. Bring back more great photos.
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I’d like to hit every National Park in the US, in Canada, in Scotland & Wales and well as National Heritage sites there. Bucket list material for sure! Also on the list in owning a cottage in Scotland.
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