Maine looks good for a start, but it is so up far in the north east, characters like mine (currently in Denver, Colorado) would have trouble justifying the long journey to New England. I say we start somewhere in the mid states, or mid coasts. I dunno, I could also change my character's location from Colorado to some place near Maine anyway.

Since we are going for hyper realism here, things like walking on foot cross-states should be taken in mind =/