North West- any must see's or travel tips? - Page 2 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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!
Welcome! We're happy you've found the PassPorter Community -- the friendliest place to plan your vacation to Walt Disney World, Disney Cruise Line, Disneyland, and the world in general! You are now viewing the PassPorter Message Board Community as a guest, which gives you limited access. As our guest, feel free to browse our messages by selecting the forum you want to visit from the list below.
To post messages and ask questions, join our FREE community today and you'll get access to tools and resources not available to guests, such as our vacation countown timers, "living" avatars, private messaging system, database searches, downloads, and a special PassPorter discount code. Registration is fast, simple, and completely free. Just click the Join Our Community link.
If you think you've already joined, log in below now. If you don't remember your member name or password, please visit our Member Name and Password Recovery page. You are also welcome to contact us.
One correction which will be a large one as far as driving is concerned - Theodore Roosevelt National Park is in North Dakota, not South Dakota - and it about a 4-5 hour drive up there.
Also - since you are right near it in the Badlands - consider Devils Tower National Monument too. We just went to Badlands, Wind Cave, Jewel Cave, Devils Tower and Theodore Roosevelt as well as Mt Rushmore this past September. Really enjoyed the trip. If you have time - take a few hours to drive through Custer State Park and the Needles Highway while in the Black Hills. Beautiful drive!!
We also visited The Minute Man Missile National Historic Monument - about 20 minutes east of Badlands.
How long will your trip take? Wind Cave has some really great tours that you can take down into the caves to see the boxwork. So does Jewel cave national monument, but I don't see it on your list.
Mt Rainer is beautiful - we took an entire day to drive around and hike all over the mountain, and since you are right in the neighborhood - don't forget to visit Mt. St. Helens National Volcanic Monument - the have a great visitor's center and some really nice hiking too.
I did have Theodore Roosevelt NP listed as North Dakota in my itinerary, I must have just mistyped it here...
Thanks for all the great suggestions (and links). They all sound wonderful and they are all right on top of where we will be.... Due to time constraints, I'm going to have to research more and pick and chose....
I'm having a hard time figuring out Mt. Saint Helen's.... It sounds like you are suggesting it is near Mount Rainier.... MapQuest is showing it in Oregon . Any ideas on that??
The trip is currently set to be 40 days long allotting 2 nights in most places... I have a little bit of flexibility, but not much as to the overall amount of days....
Quote:
Originally Posted by DrDolphin
Oh - another thing - be sure to budget no less than 4 days in Yellowstone (that wasn't even enough for us) and 2-3 days in Grand Teton. There is a great float raft trip down the Snake River in Grand Teton - we saw lots of wildlife.
I currently have the itinerary set with three nights in Yellowstone and two nights in Grand Tetons.... Unfortunately, due to overall time constraints- I don't foresee being able to make those stops any longer...
Quote:
Originally Posted by jimmymac
In Seattle, do NOOT miss Chihuly Glass & Gardens. It blew me away
I just looked at the website.... It looks beautiful! It will be right next to the Space Needle which we already have plans to visit.... I'm going to "pencil it in" and hope that time allows for it....
Thanks for all the great information everyone! This month, January is the month I plan to get all of my lodging booked which will make the itinerary firm.... I've got a little more research to do, but I'm just about ready to start booking everything
Try to do the Space Needle on a nice day as the view is amazing. However, I'd avoid eating in the restaurant as it's expensive and quite frankly the view doesn't make up for the fact that the food just isn't good enough to justify the prices. You're definitely paying a premium for the location and view at the restaurant. Since you'll be in Seattle you should visit the Pike Place Market which is one of the things that Seattle's famous for. There's always a small crowd at one of the fish vendors as they literally throw the fish. There's also a tour of underground Seattle that's interesting. Both the North Cascades & Olympic parks are very large but beautiful and I strongly recommend making sure you have a full tank gas before going in to them as towns and gas stations can be few and far between.
I currently have the itinerary set with three nights in Yellowstone and two nights in Grand Tetons.... Unfortunately, due to overall time constraints- I don't foresee being able to make those stops any longer...
I think you'll be fine with that. We had two nights in Yellowstone and one night in Grand Tetons and, while we don't do any hiking, that was plenty of time for driving around and seeing the main sights.
As for Mount Rushmore.... We plan to camp at Wind Cave NP for two nights and drive over to Mt. Rushmore.... It looks like it will be about a 40 minute drive one way.... Does this sound right? The website says to allow two hours to visit Mount Rushmore... Does this sound right? The hours are listed as 5am-11pm.... I was thinking we would go when they first open and hopefully beat out the crowds...
As for the town of Deadwood, it looks like that would be less than fifteen minutes out of our way between Mount Rushmore and Theodore Roosevelt NP. We almost certainly will not stay the night there, but I'm going to look more into the activities you listed and see if we might want to do one of them as a pit stop...
Thanks for the great information!
You will find that travelling around the Black Hills doesn't take a lot of time and the scenery is wonderful. So, I would say that 40 minutes is probably right. However, if you are like us, we found things to stop and see in between places and thus it took us a little longer to get between places.
For Mount Rushmore 2 hours may be just enough or not close. It all depends on how much of the "museum" type you are. They have a lot of displays and information that can eat up time if you are interested. Or, if you aren't you can just walk up to the viewing section, see the mountain and go away. Depending on the time of year, opening may be too chilly to enjoy yourself. You may want to wait until closer to mid day as the sun will be out to warm things up and give some beautiful views of the mountain.
Deadwood would definitely be a good pit stop.
Enjoy your planning and your trip.
__________________
Waiting for our next adventure after enjoying our Alaska cruise. Jenn
About This Page: 
....
. Any ideas on that??
Like
Thank
Pixie Dust
PassPorter Guide Author
Waiting for our next adventure after enjoying our Alaska cruise. 
Jenn
Linear Mode
