National parks, natural beauty and a bit of Disney wonder! COMPLETED - Page 37 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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.
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Loved seeing your landscape pictures along the way! It is amazing how the rock formation and color changed from one state to the next. Your hotel looked very comfortable in Utah. Looking forward to hearing about your dinner with a passporter friend
Registered Message Board Members save 30% off PassPorter guidebooks! When you register you'll have access to a discount coupon good for 30% off the list price of PassPorter books in our online store.
Sunday 11 September – part eight: an amazing meal with a PassPorter friend!
It took what felt like forever to get through Orem itself, as it had roadworks in it and it was still raining, but once we got back to highway 189, it was plain sailing. I’d sent Tricia a text to say that we probably wouldn’t be there until 7:40pm and, as we turned into the road for the Sundance resort, we saw a car that resembled the one she told us she drove. Could it be..
By the time the vehicle turned into the car park, we were pretty sure it was her and as soon as the driver’s door opened, it was! How cool that we’d managed to follow her here, it made meeting up so much easier.
We headed into the resort, with me getting some photos on the way:
My goodness, this was a heck of a sprawling resort. We had some issues finding our way to the restaurant, although that wasn’t a surprise, as it was located nowhere near the main building.
When we walked in, it was a bit surreal, as the first thing we found was the general store for the resort, which wasn’t what I was expecting to see. It was all very retro as well, which was fun.
We were given the choice of dining either by the cooking area...
... or in the back room:
I chose the latter and I was very pleased with this, as there was only one other table in here, ironically made up of a group of Brits, as we all spotted the accent pretty early on.
We were chatting away the whole way through dinner, covering a myriad of subjects. It was as if we’d known each other forever, as is so often the case on the boards. That’s why I love PassPorter so much.
I didn’t get the name of our server, but he was absolutely charming and nothing was too much trouble for him. I really warmed to him immediately and I loved the way he brought out the dessert menu, but I’m getting ahead of myself...
For appetiser, we took Tricia’s recommendation and she ordered the heirloom tomato bruschetta, with Jacobs Cove tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, basil and crostini and it was lovely. A very good choice!
For entree, I got no further than the pizza and pasta section, as I really fancied a pizza, so I went for the veggie one, leaving off the artichoke, which still left me with mushrooms, tomatoes, broccolini, pesto and mozzarella and it was excellent.
Mark went for Zoom’s baby back pork ribs with cornbread and poppyseed coleslaw, He went for the lighter choice, the half rack, as opposed to the full rack, but look at the size of what turned up! He told me it was all really good, although obviously not the lighter choice he was hoping for...
When our server brought the dessert menus out, he held them out very temptingly and Tricia asked him if he was being evil. Suddenly, he had a look of innocence on his face, but I think he was...
We all decided that we should go for it, with Mark opting for the caramel apple pie with salted caramel ice cream and caramel sauce, although he told me you really couldn’t taste the salt in the ice cream.
I went for the chocolate truffle cake with mint chocolate chip ice cream and chocolate sauce, which Tricia got as a take-out for her husband and this was wonderful, although the way it was constructed, with the ice cream on top, meant that it would collapse eventually, especially as the centre was molten chocolate!
All in all, it was a superb meal and a great choice from Tricia. She then surprised us by paying for the meal even though we told her she didn’t have to, she insisted. It had been a wonderful evening and I hope we get to see her again – either in Disney or maybe in the UK?
On the way out, we had a look at some of the history of the resort, which was really interesting...
Then it was back to our respective cars and we headed off, with Tricia following us back most of the way, before peeling off at the I-15. Once again, thanks for a great night.
We headed back to our room, where I logged on to the Internet, with a much faster connection than last night, allowing me to download the latest episode of Doctor Who.
The weather today was hot and sunny with temperatures in the high 70s, with a little bit of rain on the journey. The best thing today was the views we saw around the Grand Tetons. The worst thing today was how dull the drive was through parts of Wyoming. Today we tried going to the Sundance resort And the result was it’s a beautiful place and we had a superb meal with Tricia. The most magical moment today was seeing the views from the summit of Signal Mountain.
What a great meal you all had. We visited the resort, but didn't eat there. I wish I had known about the general store since it looks really neat. We did make it to the gift shop. Beautiful items in there but they were sooooo expensive.
I went for the chocolate truffle cake with mint chocolate chip ice cream and chocolate sauce
OMG, if you were trying to make me drool on my keyboard, you succeeded! That looks like the perfect dessert for me: chocolate cake AND mint chocolate chip ice cream, in the same dessert? Yay!
Registered Message Board Members save 30% off PassPorter guidebooks! When you register you'll have access to a discount coupon good for 30% off the list price of PassPorter books in our online store.