Gatlinburg ... a Practically Unplanned Adventure! June 27 - July 5, 2009 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Because we spent more time at Colbert Ferry than I had thought we would, I already knew that we would have to skip over the next trail to make up some time. So we crossed the bridge, and shortly came into some heavy rain in Tennessee. It was pretty rough for a while but never got so bad that we had to stop. I was really hoping to be able to drive the portion of the Old Trace that is in this area. We had done this in ‘04, but had to skip it in ‘06. I wanted to drive it today to get some pictures. But the closer we got to it, I realized we wouldn't be able to. The rain had slowed down but it was still raining, and that's no kind of weather to be driving on a 2 ½ mile dirt road! I was beginning to wonder about whether we'd be able to even have a decent picnic supper. But as we approached our supper site the rain cleared out just to a light sprinkle and eventually stopped.
Our traditional supper stop is Meriwether Lewis, milepost 385. It is so named because he is buried here. First going in, I got confused and we ended up driving around by the gravesite. (Not sure why I didn't get a picture of that! ) Going back out to the other road, we stopped at the exhibit building (log cabin) for the first time. We weren't sure it would be open this late (it was a little after 6:00), so Jay and Joshua stayed inside the truck while I went to check it out. It was open, but it wasn't so impressive that I felt the boys should come in to see for themselves. It was a small room (half of the cabin) with a few display boards about Meriwether Lewis. Perhaps "next time" I will get some pictures. After a couple of minutes I headed back out so we could go eat.
This is another of the 3 main stops on the Trace, and in addition to Lewis' gravesite area, it also has a free campground, trails and a picnic area. You have to drive about a mile in to get to the picnic area, and on the way in we wondered whether we would just have to eat in the truck, because I knew the picnic tables would be wet from the rain. We checked out the one table by the parking area, and it actually seemed to be dry - I guess the worst of the storm passed south of here. But Jay decided we should just tailgate. So he opened up the tailgate and we spread our food out on it and ate!
I got kind of bored just standing around eating my sandwich, so I started walking. While in the exhibit building I noticed that somebody had written in the guest book that the falls were awesome. I never knew there was a waterfall here. But as I walked to the end of the parking area, I could definitely hear some water. So I walked for a short distance up the trail to investigate. Nothing exciting, just where the stream went over some rocks on its way down the hillside, but you couldn't really call that a waterfall, and certainly not awesome. There were some other picnic tables in this area, which gave them a great view.
By the time I got back Jay and Joshua were about finished eating, so I asked Jay if he wanted to walk down to the river, just below the parking area but out of sight because of the hill. He wasn't so sure, he thought it wasn't going to be worth the short walk, but for some reason decided he would walk down there for a few minutes. And his reaction once we got down there? "Why didn't you tell me all this was down here?" It wasn't until I got back home and read my old trip reports that I realized that indeed, he had never seen this area! I had taken Joshua down there in ‘04 while Jay napped (he had worked all night the night before we left), and in ‘06 we were a little pressed for time so we skipped it.
At first we just walked along the river (we later found out it was the Little Swan Creek) and looked. I was amazed at how clear the water was. The way it was flowing gently over the rocks, at times you couldn't tell where the water began. We saw lots of small fish, and even crawfish in the water. Jay tried adjusting my camera several different ways to get a picture of them, but the pictures kept turning out black. We stayed down there a long time, walking a little ways in both directions. Joshua enjoyed throwing rocks in, and Jay picked out several smooth river rocks to add to our collection. Here's the pictures I took while we were down there:
After stopping off at the restroom we started driving back out to the Trace. But as we neared one of the scenic overlooks just above the picnic area, I saw that the sun was setting, so I asked Jay to stop so I could try to get some pictures. They didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped for, but I guess they're fairly decent:
This one is probably my favorite, the clouds are so cool looking:
Finally we got back on the Trace and headed north once again. But of course we didn't get very far! We pulled into the parking lot for the Sheboss Place, Milepost 400.2, because it had an interesting name and I wanted to check it out. But when we got to the parking lot, I wouldn't get out because this cute bunny was eating and I didn't want to disturb him!
Jay just rolled his eyes at me and we kept driving.
Up next: There's always time for "one more stop" ...
About This Page: 
It was pretty rough for a while but never got so bad that we had to stop. I was really hoping to be able to drive the portion of the Old Trace that is in this area. We had done this in ‘04, but had to skip it in ‘06. I wanted to drive it today to get some pictures. But the closer we got to it, I realized we wouldn't be able to. The rain had slowed down but it was still raining, and that's no kind of weather to be driving on a 2 ½ mile dirt road! 
I was beginning to wonder about whether we'd be able to even have a decent picnic supper. But as we approached our supper site the rain cleared out just to a light sprinkle and eventually stopped. 
) Going back out to the other road, we stopped at the exhibit building (log cabin) for the first time. We weren't sure it would be open this late (it was a little after 6:00), so Jay and Joshua stayed inside the truck while I went to check it out. It was open, but it wasn't so impressive that I felt the boys should come in to see for themselves. 
It was a small room (half of the cabin) with a few display boards about Meriwether Lewis. Perhaps "next time" I will get some pictures. After a couple of minutes I headed back out so we could go eat. 
It wasn't until I got back home and read my old trip reports that I realized that indeed, he had never seen this area! I had taken Joshua down there in ‘04 while Jay napped (he had worked all night the night before we left), and in ‘06 we were a little pressed for time so we skipped it.
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