On the road (1) – Six countries, nine days COMPLETED - Page 19 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Great updates Cheryl. So glad you were able to work Gernoble into your trip, the gondola ride looked amazing and that view....what a beautiful site. Glad you finally figured your way into the Abbey, so glad that you gave it one more shot before giving up...all I can say is WOW. Beautiful photos, everything looked so well perserved. Its so strange as everything is so empty but you can almost picture what it was like when the monks lived there.
The car park the car? Are you nuts? We do have that function, but we haven't tried it yet and we've had the car about eight months now... Half the reason we've not yet tried it is that it needs such a huge gap to get into - there is no way my little girl would've attempted that on her own! :
Ok maybe I'm just not up on anything remotely resembling modern car-technology - but what do you mean the car can park itself? Seriously? There's a function where a car can parallel park itself? Like you just sit back and hang out and it drives itself?
I love the geometric designs in that roof. As a geometry teacher, it really intrigues. I might just have to clip a few pictures and put them in one of my powerpoint presentations!
Ok maybe I'm just not up on anything remotely resembling modern car-technology - but what do you mean the car can park itself? Seriously? There's a function where a car can parallel park itself? Like you just sit back and hang out and it drives itself?
I'm sorry if I'm a dork here for asking, lol...
That's exactly what it is. I don't know if it's only available on our brand of cars or others, but that's the idea.
We followed the tour route, going first into the chapel, where the patients would be treated and could also enjoy the religious services, without having to move from their beds, which was very thoughtful of them.
The next rooms were also for caring for the sick and in the first, there were some displays of some of the medical implements that they used here. My goodness, that scared the living daylights out of me. No wonder they needed such a nice setting, if they were using things like that...
Here, I spotted that they had toilets, so of course we headed in there. I knew they’d be fine, as I heard someone say in French that they were “very nice toilets” and they were. They were not what I expected at all, they were very modern and pleasant. If you think that I’m dwelling a lot on the state of the toilets this trip, all I’m going to say is that you don’t have the experience of France that I have from many years ago. It seriously used to have a reputation for having the most disgusting toilets of any country and you had to pay for the privilege to use them. My childhood memories of them are not pleasant, let me tell you....
Anyway, the next room was another one for treating patients, but according to the leaflet, King Louis XVI came here and was so horrified by the fact that men and women were being treated together in the same room that he donated money to ensure it didn’t happen again in the future.
Next it was into the pharmacy and some of the bottles in the dispensing room dated from the 18th century. It was fascinating to wander round and look at them.
From there, it was into the kitchens, which we were told were in use up until 1985. By this time, the place was being used as a retirement home. However, these days they’ve restored it to how it would’ve looked in the early 20th century.
Our final stop was to see the Last Judgment Polyptych, which was put together in the 15th century. It’s got inner and outer panels and is carefully kept in a dark room, so that it’s not damaged in any way and that was beautiful.
Just like any good tourist attraction, it finally tipped you out into a shop, where we got a book about the region, a couple of postcards and a couple of fridge magnets.
By the time we came out of there, it was about 1.30 and that meant that sadly our initial plans for lunch, which had been the market outside were up in smoke, as they were packing everything away. I was particularly gutted, after I saw a sign for crepes as we exited.
However, our stomachs were both telling us that food was now a necessity, so we explored a bit of the town. My goodness, the shop displays were phenomenal here and deserved some photos.
We finally found a sandwich place and I got a two cheese Panini, while Mark got a ham and what he described as spicy meat baguette. I wasn’t sure what the spicy meats were, as they were French words I’d never come across before. While in there, we got chatting to a family from North Carolina. It turned out that her husband worked for a software company and that they’d moved to Heidelberg in Germany three months ago. That would be one of our stops in a few days’ time.
We headed back to the car with our purchases and sat there and ate them, irritating a French driver who thought that he was going to get our prime parking spot. We saw him drive by a second time and, by then, we’d finished, so pulled out a couple of seconds after he passed us by. I guess it just wasn’t his day...
Well I figured you might try to let the car park itself at one point my friend---that's a feature I don't know anyone else to have on their car! Me, I would have just plowed through with my Excursion.
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wonderful photos. the art history prof tells me that patients would have been 2-3 to a bed. now that i see those beds, that brings that bit of news much more importance! BTW, he said to tell you the photos are awesome.
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Half the reason we've not yet tried it is that it needs such a huge gap to get into - there is no way my little girl would've attempted that on her own! 
:
Melanie
PassPorter Guide Author
No wonder they needed such a nice setting, if they were using things like that... 
Parlor Panther in 'stalking mode'
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