A Whirlwind Trip to Arizona/Utah and the National Parks - COMPLETED 4/1/15 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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This trip came about at the last minute, about 6 weeks out. The question came up on what to do for spring break. We did WDW last year (when we had planned to do the Grand Canyon). We waited until the last minute, as DH has been getting bonuses at work the last few years, but they don't pay out until mid-February, so I'm never sure if we'll have the extra money for a spring break trip or not. It also usually prevents us from flying out of our home airport (BDL) as it's spring break week and 6 weeks out, airfare is outrageous. Fortunately, my in-laws live 15 minutes from ISP on Long Island, and spring break is not the same week down there, so airfares are reasonable even 6 weeks out. I started doing research, and found out that spending a week at the Grand Canyon would be a LONG time, so I looked at other sites in the area that we could see. My first plan was to fly into Phoenix, head to the Grand Canyon, and then head up to Bryce National Park and Zion National Park, flying home out of Salt Lake City. At the moment, Hertz was having a huge sale to “drive out of Arizona”. I ended up getting the rental car for $225 for a mid-size SUV for the week, when everyone else wanted $1300 or more due to the one rental. Along the initial planning, I decided to change the direction in Utah, and instead of heading to Bryce and Zion, to head to Monument Valley and then Moab (Arches NP and Canyonlands NP), still flying out of Salt Lake City. We are traveling to Vegas in July for a family reunion, so I decided if we wanted to, we could knock off Zion or Bryce at that time.
I spent a lot of time on Trip Advisor, trying to figure out our plans and where we’d stay. The main point was to get a room at the Grand Canyon (south rim). I was able to initially secure a room at Yavapai, and then moved over to Maswik. The other issue was at Monument Valley, as there is only 1 hotel on the reservation, and another a bit aways. I was able to get a room at The View http://www.monumentvalleyview.com/ so that was all set. In researching Arches National Park, there is a Fiery Furnace Tour which is supposed to be fantastic, but with a limited number of tickets. http://www.nps.gov/arch/planyourvisit/programs.htm I was able to get tickets for that, so everything was in place.
Here were our plans:
Friday, April 12th – 5:30 PM flight from ISP to PHX. Pick up rental car. Stay at Holiday Inn Express near PHX.
Saturday, April 13th – Drive from PHX to the Grand Canyon, with a few hour stop in Sedona. Check into Maswik.
Sunday, April 14th – Tour the Grand Canyon
Monday, April 15th – Tour the Grand Canyon in the morning, drive to Monument Valley in the afternoon.
Tuesday, April 16th – Drive from Monument Valley to Moab. Check into Best Western Plus Canyonlands. Arches National Park.
Wednesday, April 17th – Arches National Park. Fiery Furnace Tour at 10 AM.
Thursday, April 18th – Canyonlands National Park in the morning, Arches in the afternoon.
Friday, April 19th – Drive to Salt Lake City. Check into Hyatt Place Downtown. Visit Temple Square and the Great Salt Lake.
Saturday, April 20th – Flight back to ISP at noon.
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