On the road (1) – Six countries, nine days COMPLETED - Page 34 - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
As of January 1, 2019, we have closed our forums. This is a decision we did not come to lightly, but it is necessary. The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk. The server software itself must be updated, and it cannot be without removing the forums.
So it is with a heavy heart that we say goodbye to our long-running forums. They came online in 2000 and brought together so many wonderful Disney fans. We had friendships form, careers launch, couples marry, children born ... all because of this amazing community.
Thank you to each of you who were a part of this community. You made it possible.
And a very special thank you to our Guides (moderators), past and present, who kept our forums a happy place to be. You are the glue that held everything together, and we are forever grateful to you. Thank you aliceinwdw, Caldercup, MrsM, WillCAD, Fortissimo, GingerJ, HiddenMickey, CRCrazy, Eeyoresmom, disneyknut, disneydani, Cam22, chezp, WDWfan, Luvsun, KMB733, rescuesk, OhToodles!, Colexis Mom, lfredsbo, HiddenMickey, DrDolphin, DopeyGirl, duck addict, Disneybine, PixieMichele, Sandra Bostwick, Eeyore Tattoo, DyanKJ130, Suzy Q'Disney, LilMarcieMouse, AllisonG, Belle*, Chrissi, Brant, DawnDenise, Crystalloubear, Disneymom9092, FanOfMickey, Goofy4Goofy, GoofyMom, Home4us123, iamgrumpy, ilovedisney247, Jennifer2003, Jenny Pooh, KrisLuvsDisney, Ladyt, Laughaholic88, LauraBelle Hime, Lilianna, LizardCop, Loobyoxlip, lukeandbrooksmom, marisag, michnash, MickeyMAC, OffKilter_Lynn, PamelaK, Poor_Eeyore, ripkensnana, RobDVC, SHEANA1226, Shell of the South, snoozin, Statelady01, Tara O'Hara, tigger22, Tink and Co., Tinkerbelz, WDWJAMBA, wdwlovers, Wendyismyname, whoSEZ, WildforWD, and WvuGrrrl. You made the magic.
We want to personally thank Sara Varney, who coordinated our community for many years (among so many other things she did for us), and Cheryl Pendry, our Message Board Manager who helped train our Guides, and Ginger Jabour, who helped us with the PassPorter-specific forums and Live! Guides. Thank you for your time, energy, and enthusiasm. You made it all happen.
There are other changes as well.
Why? Well, the world has changed. And change with it, we must. The lyrics to "We Go On" for IllumiNations say it best:
We go on to the joy and through the tears
We go on to discover new frontiers
Moving on with the current of the years.
We go on
Moving forward now as one
Moving on with a spirit born to run
Ever on with each rising sun.
To a new day, we go on.
It's time to move on and move forward.
PassPorter is a small business, and for many years it supported our family. But the world changed, print books took a backseat to the Internet, and for a long time now it has been unable to make ends meet. We've had to find new ways to support our family, which means new careers and less and less time available to devote to our first baby, PassPorter.
But eventually, we must move on and move forward. It is the right thing to do.
So we are retiring this newsletter, as we simply cannot keep up with it. Many thanks to Mouse Fan Travel who supported it all these years, to All Ears and MousePlanet who helped us with news, to our many article contributors, and -- most importantly -- to Sara Varney who edited our newsletter so wonderfully for years and years.
And we are no longer charging for the Live Guides. If you have a subscription, it's yours to keep for the lifetime of the Live Guides at no additional cost. The Live Guides will stay online, barring server issues and technical problems, for all of 2019.
That said, PassPorter is not going away. Most of the resources will remain online for as long as we can support them, and after that we will find ways to make whatever we can available. PassPorter means a great deal to us, and to many of you, and we will do our best to keep it alive in whatever way we can. Our server costs are high, and they'll need to come out of our pockets, so in the future you can expect some changes so we can bring those costs down.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for your amazing support over the years. Without you, there's no way us little guys could have made something like this happen and given the "big guys" a run for their money. PassPorter was consistently the #3 guidebook after the Unofficial and Official guides, which was really unheard of for such a small company to do. We ROCKED it thanks to you and your support and love!
If you miss us, you can still find some of us online. Sara started a new blog at DisneyParkPrincess.com -- I strongly urge you to visit and get on her mailing list. She IS the Disney park princess and knows Disney backward and forward. And I am blogging as well at JenniferMaker.com, which is a little craft blog I started a couple of years ago to make ends meet. You can see and hear me in my craft show at https://www.youtube.com/c/jennifermaker . Many PassPorter readers and fans are on Facebook, in groups they formed like the PassPorter Trip Reports and PassPorter Crafting Challenge (if you join, just let them know you read about it in the newsletter). And some of our most devoted community members started a forum of their own at Pixie Dust Lane and all are invited over.
So we encourage you to stay in touch with us and your fellow community members wherever works best for you!
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Tuesday 23 March – part four: the most beautiful lake scenes ever....
Then our route took us back alongside another lake, this time Lake Thunersee. There were two ways of driving around this, either taking the north side or the south side, and after much debate with my guidebook, I opted for the north. One of Mark’s work colleagues often stays near here and later told him that we’d made the right decision.
On the way, we stopped off at a few places. Our first stop was Hilterfingen, which has a castle, called Huneg, which we found completely by accident. We pulled over to the side of the road and were busy taking photos of the lake, when I spotted something in the trees and it was the castle!
A couple of miles further down the road and we hit Oberhofen, or rather we managed to drive through it. I insisted on turning round and going back into it, as I wanted to find the lakeside castle here that dates from the 12th century, as I’d seen so many photos of it. Finally, we did find our way back and parked up. Very nicely, they gave us an hour’s free parking. Then we walked down to the waterfront, walking through a group of schoolchildren who were playing outside, with some of them playing down by the lake in the water. We both commented on how odd that was. There was no way you could do that at home, not with all the security we have now at our schools. It was almost a pleasant change to see schoolchildren out playing naturally with people just walking by.
We walked down to get our photos and it really was like a ghost town here. Sadly, the boat trips that run in the main season from here didn’t start for another week or so and it felt completely dead, with nothing open. I was therefore absolutely amazed to find the public toilets open here and they were actually pretty decent as well.
We headed back on the road and, not too much further down the road, we stopped at Merligen, not even mentioned in my guidebook, but home to some to excellent views all the same, even if the atmosphere was spoilt somewhat by the work going on just a little way up the road, where they were chopping down trees.
From there, the beautiful views continued as we continued along the path of the lake down to Interlaken. I don’t think I could ever get enough of seeing beautiful snow-capped mountains looming above crystal blue lakes. :
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Just catching up on some great posts. I live vircariously through your photos, they are wonderful and really give off not only the scenery but the feel of each place you visit.
Love the mountain photos - what a beautiful backdrop, so peaceful and tranquil, I could definitely spend time just sitting there looking out at everything.
Postcard-picture-perfect. Every stinkin' one of 'em!!!! I'm also glad you took the north road around the lake!
(we're off to Colorado in a few months, so I'm thankful to get my fill of the Rocky Mountains soon since your photos really have me longing to see some mountains!)
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for all the pictures as I'm feeling like I'm almost there.
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We both commented on how odd that was. There was no way you could do that at home, not with all the security we have now at our schools. It was almost a pleasant change to see schoolchildren out playing naturally with people just walking by. 
Sadly, the boat trips that run in the main season from here didn’t start for another week or so and it felt completely dead, with nothing open. I was therefore absolutely amazed to find the public toilets open here and they were actually pretty decent as well. 
: 
Disney Magic - Oct 2015
Can't wait to see more.
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