Yellowstone Legacy in Pictures

It's almost here! Yellowstone Legacy, Book 7 in the Yellowstone Romance Series is set to go live on July 12th! I'm really excited about this book for several reasons. I thought Origins was difficult to write last year. (I wrote a blog post about it. You can read it here) I never expected to struggle that much with another book ever again. Boy, was I wrong! 
I struggled for over seven months to get Legacy written. Some of it was trying to get the story to come together exactly the way I had envisioned it, but a lot of the delays had to do with very personal reasons that I may someday have the courage to talk about, but not today. I even set the book aside for a while to write something "light." That was Cora's Pride (Book 1 in the Wilderness Brides Series), a book that was the start of a new series that's been in my head. It took me about a month to write that book, and I wanted to dive right in and write the second book, but I had to get Legacy done first. 

I've had a lot of readers ask me to include photos of the places I write about in my books. That's not really possible to do in a romance novel, so I've tried to post as many images as I can on my Facebook page and in the fan group there. I've also created a Pinterest board with images specifically from locations in the Yellowstone books. 

For the latest book, Yellowstone Legacy, I've compiled some images of the places my characters see and experience, that I would like to share in this post. While some of the images I'm going to post are mine, I've also used photos I couldn't possibly take myself from the Yellowstone website photo archives (public domain images), and quite a few are from photographs taken by a company called Trail Guides Yellowstone. They offer guided backpacking trips to various awesome locations in the Yellowstone backcountry. Their images are copyrighted, but they were gracious enough to allow me to post some of the photos from their website in this post. 

So, I'll stop talking now, and let the pictures speak for themselves (with captions):

 This first image is an overview of the Buffalo Plateau with the Yellowstone River, on the Helloraring Creek Trail leading to the Black Canyon of the Yellowstone (image used with permission)

On the way to Hellroaring Creek on the hike to get to the Black Canyon of the Yellowstone (image used with permission)

More images of the terrain my characters navigated in Yellowstone Legacy (images used with permission)

Hellroaring Creek (image used with permission)

Hellroaring Creek as it flows into the Yellowstone River (image used with permission)

The Black Canyon of the Yellowstone (image used with permission)

Black Canyon of the Yellowstone (image used with permission

Yellowstone River suspension bridge (image used with permission)

Bridge over Hellroaring Creek (image used with permission)

Hellroaring Creek Trail (one of my pictures because yes, I do actually hike most of the trails I talk about in the books :D Husband and sons ahead of me on the trail )

Another of my personal photos along the Hellroaring Creek Trail. This is after crossing the Yellowstone River Suspension Bridge before coming out onto the Buffalo Plateau and heading toward Hellroaring Creek

Taking a break, overlooking Hellroaring Creek (which isn't in the picture)

Along Hellroaring Creek, which was more like a raging river when we made this hike. I did a blog post about this particular trail, about my experience the first time I hiked this trail. Well, I've come a long way since that first experience, which you can read about here

Yellowstone River in the Black Canyon of the Yellowstone (image used with permission)

Yellow-bellied marmot

Wolf and two bears (mama bear and baby bear)

Albright Visitor Center at Mammoth Hot Springs

Fort Yellowstone at Mammoth Hot Springs, Residential Area

Albright Visitor Center, Mammoth Hot Springs

Fort Yellowstone/Mammoth Hot Springs are (image from 1977)

                                     Mammoth Hot Springs and Fort Yellowstone (image from 1977)

                                 Mammoth Hot Springs (image from 1977)

Wildflowers on the trail up Mount Washburn (2015)

View from near the top of Mount Washburn (2015) Those white dots on the side of the hill on the right are Bighorn Sheep

View from the top of Mount Washburn as clouds are rolling in (this was July 2015, and it snowed that day. We just made it down the mountain before the weather got bad)

Another view from the top of Mount Washburn, looking to the south. You can sort of see the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, and the brightest area in the picture is where Yellowstone Lake would be. 

And finally, I'm tossing in this image, because I think it's just a really neat photo (from the Yellowstone website), and although my characters in Legacy don't make a stop at the falls, they are definitely mentioned plenty of times in many of the other books. This shows the Upper Falls of the Yellowstone River on the left, and then the river makes a slight bend, and plunges down the Lower Falls on the right, to continue on its course northward  (yes, the Yellowstone is a north-flowing river)  through the spectacular Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. The parking lot in the center is the Uncle Tom's Trail Parking lot. 

So, I'm looking forward to book launch in three days (July 12, 2016) on the book that took so long to write. I hope it lives up to reader expectations! I plan on working on a few books in a couple of other series before I tackle the next book in the Yellowstone Series. 

meme created by one of my beta readers!