Boating on the Broads COMPLETED 5/19 - Page 14 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Roy's reminds me of a modern day Wall Drugs. Anyone who has driving through South Dakota knows what I am talking about. Wall, SD is a tiny down at the entrance to the Badlands, and for miles and miles you see signs advertising Wall Drugs. Then you get there and it is a big store that is pretty much the whole town. It was great back in the day because they offered "free ice water", which was quite rare. Anyway, it just reminded me of that.
Sure is a beautiful sight to wake up to, even if it is stupid o'clock.
Yeah, that bed would not work for us. Holy cow, that's tiny! I'm 5-10 and DH is 6-3. We couldn't even fold up neatly together in there! Glad it wasn't a problem for you guys though!
My goodness, you're right - that really wouldn't have worked for you guys!
Roy's reminds me of a modern day Wall Drugs. Anyone who has driving through South Dakota knows what I am talking about. Wall, SD is a tiny down at the entrance to the Badlands, and for miles and miles you see signs advertising Wall Drugs. Then you get there and it is a big store that is pretty much the whole town. It was great back in the day because they offered "free ice water", which was quite rare. Anyway, it just reminded me of that.
Sounds cool! One day I do want to make it there to see some more national parks, so maybe I'll get to see that too....
Saturday 19 April – part two: heading out on a steam railway
We headed back to the boat, and paid up for our stay here until tomorrow morning. We couldn’t believe the great deal we got. It’s £10 per night between 5:00pm and 9:00am remember, and then £1.50 per hour at the other times. That’s a full price of around £35. The guy charged us £17.50!
We chatted to the people who run this, and asked about recommendations for restaurants. It sounds as if we went to the best last night, so we’ll have to see what we do tonight.
We also asked about the swans, and whether the ones that still have some grey on them are cygnets, and they are, either one or two years old. I had no idea that they kept their grey feathers for that long! You learn something new every day…
We relaxed on the boat for a bit, and I did a bit more of my cross stitch – getting there gradually!
We headed out about 10:30am towards the Bure Valley Railway station. You know we’d said about how much we’d already seen of Roy’s in Wroxham? Well, we also found Roy’s car park on the way to the station! Honestly, everything here is owned by Roy – at least that’s the way it seemed.
We weren’t quite sure which way to go when we got to the station, so we carried on along the main road, which was a bad decision, as there were no pavements on either side of the road so we were walking along the road, with cars coming either way. Not good! Thankfully we made it to the station in one piece.
We headed inside to buy our tickets (£25 or $40 for the two of us), and then we headed out on to the platform to see what was happening with the train. I was glad we did, as they were in the process of turning the engine around, something we hadn’t seen happen since back in San Francisco in 2006, when we watched them turn the trolleys around. That was very neat.
I said to Mark that I imagine working here is a real treat for a lot of people. Can you imagine being able to drive your own steam engine? I’m sure there are lots of little (and not so little ) boys who dream of doing that!
Then we walked up to the other end of the train to watch them reversing the engine back down to the train.
While we were there, we got chatting to a woman whose son had been given a piece of coal by the train driver. He’d passed it to her and she’d put it in the pocket of her nice cream coat. Let’s just say that it didn’t look so cream now around the pocket the coal was in! It also didn’t look like a washable coat to me…
We asked if we could sit anywhere, and you could, so we headed towards the front of the train. I was very impressed with the facilities they had on board – very nice seating as you can see.
We left a bit later than the timetable said – I reckon more like 11:15am, rather than the scheduled 11:10am, but then again, this isn’t Switzerland, and let’s be honest our trains aren’t known for their punctuality.
There was some very nice countryside as we went along…
We made a stop at the first station. All the stations, except for the ones at the start and end of the line, which were the ones we were travelling between, are request only. A big group put a request in, and then jumped in our carriage. I wouldn’t mind, but they were all bundled up, and one guy insisted on opening the window. I was very comfortable in my light cardigan, but not once we were moving along with the window open. I was very glad when they all got off at the next stop. They were carrying huge bags and Mark thought they were inflatable kayaks. Rather them than me!
Isn’t the garden amazing at this station? I was very impressed with all the spring bulbs out. It just looked lovely.
We had to stop at one point to let the train going the other way pass, and it turned out to be the perfect place to stop. Why? Have a look and see…
As we headed towards our destination, the lights suddenly came on inside the carriage, which was interesting, as I hadn’t even realised they were lights. Of course, that could only mean one thing, and sure enough, we were entering a relatively short tunnel soon afterwards.
Very nice of the boatyard to give you such a reduced price on the berth. That steam train I'm sure is a big draw for train fans. They keep it up beautifully.
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Luke would love to engineer a steam locomotive as he :loves: trains! So far your journey has had such beautiful scenery, and I was so happy to see cows. I kept wondering as I scrolled through pictures if there would be cows.
Very nice of the boatyard to give you such a reduced price on the berth. That steam train I'm sure is a big draw for train fans. They keep it up beautifully.
It was a lovely train - I was very impressed with it.
Luke would love to engineer a steam locomotive as he :loves: trains! So far your journey has had such beautiful scenery, and I was so happy to see cows. I kept wondering as I scrolled through pictures if there would be cows.
You know me - I can always find cows! There were a lot alongside the motorway today as I drove to another of our offices, which made me very happy!
Peaceful morning on the boat. And a good deal too.
The train looks so cute! Did it feel kind of odd to be seeing sights on land after 24 hours or so on water?
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Peaceful morning on the boat. And a good deal too.
The train looks so cute! Did it feel kind of odd to be seeing sights on land after 24 hours or so on water?
It did. The weirdest thing was seeing cars on the roads and thinking that's how we usually travel...
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One day I do want to make it there to see some more national parks, so maybe I'll get to see that too....
they are, either one or two years old. I had no idea that they kept their grey feathers for that long! You learn something new every day… 
Honestly, everything here is owned by Roy – at least that’s the way it seemed. 
so we were walking along the road, with cars coming either way. Not good! 
I was very glad when they all got off at the next stop. They were carrying huge bags and Mark thought they were inflatable kayaks. Rather them than me! 
Of course, that could only mean one thing, and sure enough, we were entering a relatively short tunnel soon afterwards. 
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