On the road (1) – Six countries, nine days COMPLETED - Page 30 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Monday 22 March – part seven: this puts Key West to shame!
We headed back to the car and went to programme in the details of our hotel for the night into Tim, but wouldn’t you know it, he couldn’t find the road! Thank goodness for the map we had bought before our trip of Germany, Switzerland and a couple of other countries, as it had a map in it of Montreux and I was able to spot the road we wanted. Between Tim getting us to the general vicinity and then me directing from there, we found it.
Once we got there, the next issue was parking. Mark pulled up outside, so I could go and check in. While I was in there, the guy on reception asked if I wanted a drink while I was waiting. Er, : my husband’s outside and has nowhere to park. He asked if I wanted to pay for parking and I immediately said It would cost 15CHF ($14.20) but, to me, that was well worth it. We followed the directions, but managed to miss the reserved spaces on our first sweep by and ended up having to do a U-turn a bit further up the road, but there they were, two reserved spaces for the hotel, one of which was ours.
I couldn’t unlock the darned bollard, so poor old Mark had to come and help me and then reverse into a space. He has been a star so far this vacation!
We headed into the hotel and let’s just say that it’s very unique. Fortunately, I had read some reviews on Trip Advisor, so I knew what to expect. We quickly found our room and it was absolutely fine for the night. At first, we couldn’t find any English channels, but then we got some. I equally had problems getting the free wi-fi to work at first, but that was down to our laptop and finally I was able to get it sorted.
The unique corridors
We spent half an hour or so in the room, before hunger got the better of us and we set off for the town again.
We managed to snag a parking space in the centre of town, just as it turned 6.00. This was significant, as you could only park there for an hour, but that was up until 7.00. Just as we walked up to the machine, it turned to 6.00 and we put our money in and lo and behold, we were allocated parking until 7.00 the next morning when the parking fees started again. By the time we’d put the ticket in the car, good grief, there were about three cars looking for a space. We really lucked out again.
Although we were hungry, we were distracted by the sight of the beautiful setting sun and the beautiful mirror effect on the lake. We had to get some photos of that.
One of my all time favourite photos of Mark
We wandered back up to the Freddie Mercury statue and got loads more photos there. We both agreed it was a stunning sight and much better than the sunset we’d seen in Key West. It was a real added bonus and very unexpected at that.
Apparently these were meant to represent the characters from the films Madagascar
By now, we couldn’t ignore our stomachs any longer, so we headed over the road to browse some menus. We really liked the look of the second place we saw, an Italian pizzeria, but it looked dead and as if it was closed. I pulled at the door and was amazed when it opened, as I really did think that it was closed, but no, it wasn’t.
We walked in and asked for a table for two and, after copious checking of their list of reservations for the night, we were asked where we wanted to sit. I didn’t want to push my luck. I liked the look of the front of the restaurant that looked out over the lake and the stunning sunset, but I didn’t like to say anything, so I was secretly delighted when we were taken that way.
We sat down and studied the menu, noticing that a lot of tables around us did have reserved notices on, so dead as it was now, it looked like it would be a lot busier later on.
We made our selections, with me going for the crayfish bisque to begin with and Mark opting for the minestrone soup. When they turned up, we had massive bowls full of the stuff and neither disappointed. I was in paradise with my choice, which was beautiful and very rich.
Just before those arrived, I nipped out to go and get some more photos of the sunset, which was looking even more vivid than it had earlier... it was a truly beautiful sight.
The restaurant we were eating in
For main course, Mark went for a pizza and started to regret that choice when he saw it being made. As he said, “that’s as big as our table”! Well, it wasn’t quite that bad, but it was huge! Sadly I can’t prove it, as I don’t seem to have a photo of it.
I went for the pasta with smoked salmon, leeks and a white wine sauce and it was lovely, if a little salty, but there was just far too much of it for me.
We also sampled a glass of wine each of the Montreux house wine that they had. Having seen all the vineyards around today, I felt we had to give it a go and, although very dry, it was still fairly pleasant.
As we ate, the place did fill up and many of them seemed to be locals, as there was lots of kissing with the wait staff when they saw them. That’s always a good sign and we had, indeed, made a great choice for dinner. The bill came to 94.40CHF ($90), which we didn’t think was too bad and certainly not for such a place in a prime location with a lake view.
When we came out of there, we took a final few photos of Montreux and the lake at night.
Then it was back to the car and back to the hotel. When we got there, we were very glad that we had paid for our reserved parking spot, as there wasn’t a single parking spot to be had along with the row of parking by the hotel. We’d have had to have driven a fair way further up the road to park and that wouldn’t have been fun to walk back down in the dark. :
We were back at the hotel by around 8.00 and spent the rest of the evening sorting out the hundreds of photos we’d taken today and getting online. Sadly, I also spent a large proportion of the evening in the bathroom, as something I’d eaten earlier obviously hadn’t agreed with me.
Today we drove 71 miles. The weather today was sunny with temperatures in the 60s. The best thing today was all the beautiful views around Lake Geneva. The worst thing today was my stomach in the evening. Today we tried staying in Montreux And the result was it’s an amazing city and absolutely beautiful, a very good choice to stay in. The most magical moment today was seeing all the snow capped mountains around Lake Geneva.
Beautiful, beautiful sunset pictures. That lake just looks so serene. I like that picture of Mark, too. Sorry your stomach was upset and I hope you're feeling okay the next day.
I agree with Wendy, great sunset and beautiful night pictures of the lake!
That is a very nice picture of that infamous character: Mark, the Magnificent! It's good to see the Swiss know where to put such dastardly criminals as he.
Ok the Madagascar photos cracked me up because the first thing I thought when I saw them was "Hey, is that Alex the lion??" Glad to have you confirm that for me.
SUCH beautiful photos of the sunset and the lake. Just wow all around. I can imagine that if the photos are that pretty, seeing it live must have been spectactular!
Gorgeous. Absolutely gorgeous photos of the lake and the sunsets. Especially the night pictures. Oh my, they're beautiful!!! If this doesn't get up the courage for my DH to make that long flight over the Atlantic, I don't know what will!!! I can't wait to show him these later tonight.
Glad you got some good parking spots, it sure sounded tricky. Dinner sounded delicious!
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That is a very nice picture of that infamous character: Mark, the Magnificent! It's good to see the Swiss know where to put such dastardly criminals as he.
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Thank goodness for the map we had bought before our trip of Germany, Switzerland and a couple of other countries, as it had a map in it of Montreux and I was able to spot the road we wanted. Between Tim getting us to the general vicinity and then me directing from there, we found it. 
: my husband’s outside and has nowhere to park. He asked if I wanted to pay for parking and I immediately said 
those nighttime shots with the lights shining on the water! 
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