Last Tuesday Ann and I hit the road to do research for the next book.  Having written much of the book already, I still have many details to add.  Nothing can replace following the pathes of your characters to see, smell, and hear what they would see, smell hear (hence the reason I need to write a book with Europe as the backdrop 🙂 ).  In this case, we had the follow the characters as they ferried from Seattle to Bainbridge Island, drove up to thePort Townsend area and then ferried over to Whidbey Island and finally ferried from Whidbey to Mukilteo to drive back to Renton. While we had to take three Washington State Ferries and cross one floating bridge, the characters travel in different ways to different places, so I’m giving away little with this information.

Here are a few pictures from our trip.  In this picture, we are on the Ferry from Seattle to Bainbridge Island.  You’ll note the new addition to the Seattle Waterfront on the right of the photo, the giant ferris wheel, which doesn’t look so giant against the buildings in the background:

Here I am at Port Gamble, enjoying the sites and sounds of the quaint little former company town (ok actually I am checking email):

Ann found a big gun at Fort Flagler.  She does enjoy her weapons.  She provided a running tutorial on what was missing:

As the suns sets at Mutiny Bay, we snap our picture at the exact location I include in the book: