National parks, natural beauty and a bit of Disney wonder! COMPLETED - Page 71 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Poor Mark, with all that driving on a very boring stretch of highway, and then the windy stretch, in the dark. Glad the hotel room was so nice, though. Can't believe it's time for you to pack up and fly to Chicago!
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The drive reminded me of driving from Arizona to California. There are stretches of highway where there is nothing but desert for miles!! I the Hampton Inn, they have the most wonderful beds!!
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We have a ton of roundabouts here in my area of Maryland. It's funny, because if people aren't used to them, they make it a nightmare for those who are. I actually like them because half the time people don't know what to do when the come to a four way stop anyway.
Yes, that's a scary part of the west with no places to stop. You drove past Parachute, CO along the way. I had a great aunt and uncle who lived there and we visited back in 1988. Desolate area. I'm looking forward to your photos and thoughts on your next stretch of road through and after Glenwood Springs -- in the daylight! Let's just say our DD got a little carsick through that area.....
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The drive reminded me of driving from Arizona to California. There are stretches of highway where there is nothing but desert for miles!! I the Hampton Inn, they have the most wonderful beds!!
I'm becoming a huge fan of the Hampton Inn, I've been very impressed by our stays there.
We have a ton of roundabouts here in my area of Maryland. It's funny, because if people aren't used to them, they make it a nightmare for those who are. I actually like them because half the time people don't know what to do when the come to a four way stop anyway.
Tell me about it! As we have roundabouts everywhere - and I find them so simple (just give way to the right (over here anyway ) I get so annoyed when people just sit there...
No way that was only 5 days!!! Ok, now that I stop and think about your hotel nights, I guess it really could've been 5 days. How in the world did you get so much packed into just 5 days?!
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Yes, that's a scary part of the west with no places to stop. You drove past Parachute, CO along the way. I had a great aunt and uncle who lived there and we visited back in 1988. Desolate area. I'm looking forward to your photos and thoughts on your next stretch of road through and after Glenwood Springs -- in the daylight! Let's just say our DD got a little carsick through that area.....
Parachute was one option I looked at staying that night when I was planning this trip. Interesting about the car sickness - I thought the area we went through this night was worse than what we encountered the next morning....
Looks like you made a good choice for your hotel stay!
I definately plan to get the Frommer's Guide book.... I think I may go ahead and look it up shortly and get it ordered today; as the summer will be here before we know it and I want ample time to read..... not to mention, I've already started the booking process on some parts of our trip.... and need to get rolling with the rest of it....
Your trip report has been a wealth of information; I've certainly been taking notes and I will now add to me notes- Never let the gas tank get below half a tank! Man, I would hate to run out of gas out there in the true middle of nowhere.... And I have a bad habit here around home of running the tank to pretty near empty as I simply hate getting gas for some reason; but that doesn't sound like an option out there....
Looking forward to more....
To be honest, that's my fear for you as well, having seen how busy it was when we were there.
I'll tell you something I found very useful (and forgive me if I've already mentioned this...) Frommer's guide to the US National Parks of the American West. I found it invaluable and it's got information about camping, crowds and lots of other things, which is why I thought it might be helpful.
I just ordered the book from Amazon and should have it in a few days. I read the parks that it covers; and it will cover 13 of the NP's we will be visiting this summers, so I know I will get my money's worth. Hopefully this can help me decide which park to camp in.... as it is, I was hoping to have had all this booked already and need to get booked one way or another here very soon....
Friday 16 September – part one: wow, that’s fresh snow!
We got going reasonably quickly this morning, as there was the joy of packing and bringing the remaining three cases in under 50lbs. With the exception of one that had to have stuff removed from it three times it was accomplished relatively painlessly, with a good bit of give weight wise in one of our cases, which is always a good sign.
That done, we headed down for breakfast and there was a pretty good spread. I was impressed by the fresh fruit and the cheese omelette, which was much better than I thought it would be. The only downside was the cereal selection. I like things like Frosted Flakes, Corn Flakes, Rice Krispies, but there was nothing like that here, just kiddies’ things, so I passed.
As I sat there, one of the cleaning staff came past and asked how my day was going, while we watched what we assumed to be a manager give flowers to a group of cleaners. Everyone here seemed genuinely happy and as if they wanted to be here and that’s so often not the case at hotels. :
Our very nice hotel!
We hit the road just after 9:00am, getting some photographic proof first of the rotaries, before we returned to the Interstate.
Within a few miles, I was happy with my Colorado cow sightings!
Wow, the scenery was certainly something this morning. We headed up through mountains, with ski resorts dotted around, reminding us of our Switzerland road trip. It was absolutely beautiful here.
We also admired the river flowing next to us, as we zigzagged around it...
Then there were the various tunnels carved through the mountains...
But perhaps the best was the sight of snow on the top of the mountains and this was fresh snow too. Well, the forecast had told us that it had snowed in Aspen just two days ago and that’s where we were now. I guess the winter season will be in full effect soon....
Next: “does it have meat in it?”, “no just chicken”
The hotel sounds really nice. I've always been happy with Hampton Inns. Isn't it amazing that just a day before the scenery was all dry red rock and now you're in green mountains topped with snow!
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the Hampton Inn, they have the most wonderful beds!!
As we have roundabouts everywhere - and I find them so simple (just give way to the right (over here anyway 
. Hopefully this can help me decide which park to camp in.... as it is, I was hoping to have had all this booked already and need to get booked one way or another here very soon....
: 
Well, the forecast had told us that it had snowed in Aspen just two days ago and that’s where we were now. I guess the winter season will be in full effect soon.... 
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