A return to Switzerland – land of mountains, museums and moos! COMPLETED 12/4 - Page 72 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Your hotel looks very nice and you found a perfect spot to have dinner and watch the sunset. Crazy that the restaurant doesn't take credit cards. I never even think to check any more.
I don't in the US or UK, as pretty much everywhere does, but continental Europe is a bit different in that respect...
What a gorgeous view from your room! Even though on the ground floor, you're still so high up that the view is still great. Dinner looked absolutely delicious! Fresh ice cream from Liechtenstien cows, I'm sure.
You were so right about my liking this update's photos. What wonderful scenery to end your day on. You all have had such wonderful rooms and the views to go with them.
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Love the hotel. Your bath looks quite reminiscent of the one I had in Reims, France back in May. Quite similar!
Quite odd with that pizza restaurant not taking credit cards. Never had a problem with this in my many trips to Europe! Although, many establishments don't take Amex, especially outside the big cities like London, Rome etc. I found this to be true in some of the smaller French towns this year. So at least I could build up my Disney Rewards Visa Points!
Nice views of the sunset, clouds etc. from the restaurant!
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October 6, 2017-Enjoying an amazing dinner at Victoria & Albert's with PP's Dot and Drew
My TR from my most recent trip is now underway. Includes: Universal Studios Florida, Disney World and Sea World Orlando Trifecta TR -Updated December 10th! TR is now COMPLETED!
You were so right about my liking this update's photos. What wonderful scenery to end your day on. You all have had such wonderful rooms and the views to go with them.
Quite odd with that pizza restaurant not taking credit cards. Never had a problem with this in my many trips to Europe! Although, many establishments don't take Amex, especially outside the big cities like London, Rome etc. I found this to be true in some of the smaller French towns this year. So at least I could build up my Disney Rewards Visa Points!
It's true about Amex, but I find that the world over that only some retailers accept it. We found quite a few places in Germany a couple of years ago that didn't take credit cards, including some big tourist attractions.
Friday 6 September – part one: exploring Liechtenstein….
For once, I really didn’t want to get up today, but the church opposite had other ideas. We’d heard it chiming on the way back from the pizzeria last night, and I was hoping it wouldn’t go all night, and in fairness it didn’t, but I heard just before 6:30am. Ok, so I guess I’ll be up then…
The sun was up, and it was interesting to see how the light spread across the valley as the sun came up…
By the time the sun was fully up, we could see the extent of Liechtenstein laid out in front of us. It may be a small country, with a population of only 36,000, but my goodness, there are a lot of people who live here, as you can see from these photos…
To give you some more information on Liechtenstein, it borders Switzerland, with which (as you’ve already seen) it has an open border, and Austria. We’re assuming the border isn’t open there, and that it’s more like the Swiss border the last time we crossed it in 2010. It’s approximately 62 square miles and it’s the only country to lie completely in the Alps. The country has a constitutional monarchy, just like the UK, and in another similarity to us, it also has an elected Parliament. Unlike us, the current reigning Prince still has significant political authority. Like its Swiss neighbour, it’s also a direct democracy, meaning its people can propose new laws or amendments to laws.
One thing we noticed here were the amount of buses out on the roads. It surprised us, not least because they had to navigate the various switchbacks, but we just hadn’t seen that many outside of cities in Switzerland. Here, they were everywhere, even in this small village.
We headed down for breakfast, and it was a pleasant enough spread, although definitely not the variety we’ve seen over the last couple of days. I guess we’ve become a bit spoilt…
It was a bit bizarre when we went to check out. They were busy with breakfast, and there did seem to be a lot of people in there (when we ate, there was us, a pair of guys and a family of three and that was it). They saw us, but never came over, so eventually I took a leaf out of the German guys’ book, when they just left their key at reception and departed. We were supposed to be paying when we checked out, but I knew they had our card, and we hadn’t got any extra charges, so I decided to chance it.
We set off just before 9:00am, and made our way gingerly down the road full of switchbacks, although it was made easier by the fact that we were following a bus ( another one , so we had to go quite slowly.
We decided that we’d go into Vaduz, the capital city of Liechtenstein, so that we could knock another one off the list. As we approached it, we found McDonald’s – civilisation!
There was also the Liechtenstein outlet centre. I know most towns have outlet centres, but this is an outlet centre for a whole country!
We passed through the industrial section of the town, which was pretty big:
Beautiful sunrise, even if you didn't really want to be up to see it! Yikes to that shot of the road ahead on your GPS. Looks like a child's drawing of a road!
Well, if you're going to be up that early, you may as well grab the camera.
I don't think I'd like to be on one of those buses! I'm sure the drivers are well trained and all, but I'd rather be in my own car. Yikes!
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Tanya
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