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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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With a little over 2 weeks to go, I thought it was about time to start a pre trip report. There have been a lot of changes to this trip report. I think the appropriate name is REALLY, Another Change PTR. Without further ado let’s get acquainted with the cast this year.
Danny (Dad) 50 something, has been very supportive of me this year. If it wasn’t for him & my mom I don’t know what I would have done. We joke around with him calling him Grumpy. Doesn’t usually want to know too much about the planning until almost time to go. Even though he has a tired meter & has to make sure the tired meter doesn’t get to high. He works for the Ohio Turnpike. This will be his 6th trip to WDW. The first trip was his & my mom honeymoon offsite. The last 5 trips were since 2005 once a year. He enjoys swimming at the hotel & loves the TL wave pool. For a guy who is not into Disney much he is a new proud owner of BLT.
Debbi (Mom) aka (Mickey28) 40 something she is one of my best friend & at WDW is definitely my shopping buddy. We have a blast when we go to WDW. She is definitely is planning pal. We always do what we like to call Disney math. She used to own an ice cream shop with my grandma. They sold it 3 weeks before we left last year. As of right now is in temporary retirement. After working 7 days a week 10 hours a day in the summer for the last 9 years, she needs a break. She is excited about being an owner of BLT. She has been on the same number of trips as my dad.
Shayne (Dbro) 17 y.o. he is my baby brother. He does garden tractor pulling, takes a market hog to our fair & bowling. His favorite characters are Goofy & Mater. This will be his 5th trip in the last 5 years. He doesn’t get excited until right before we leave but has a great time. He loves his pin trading that is what WDW is all about for him. He loves all the pins he gets. I think he has over hundred. He should be interesting this year. He more independent & is all about the girls.
Amy (Me) 30 y.o. I am currently a care giver for my grandma. She fell in Jan. & broke her leg. She couldn’t get to a phone & laid there for 5 hours. While she was at the hospital she had a stroke. She has a brace for her leg. So I have been staying with her for the last 5 months at night. I had been waitress for the last 12 years but this year I worked at two different restaurants that closed down. I am kind of burnt out with restaurants closing down. When we get back I am planning on doing the care giving full time. My mom & I are the planners of the family. We start about 11 months out with schedule & what we like to change from the year before. When the hours come out than we make all of our final changes. Tinkerbell is my favorite character & a cute little blue alien.
That is the cast as of now. I am sure with the TR title there might be some changes.
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I hope that you and your family have a magical time at the world
__________________
Heather - "I'm Tinkerbell's biggest fan!"
WDW - August 1997 Off Property
WDW - January 2005 AKL
WDW - May 2006 Pop Century
WDW- november-dec 2007 pop century
WDW- dec/jan 2009/2010 pop century
WDW- oct/nov 2012 art of animation
WDW- sept 2013 port Orleans riverside
WDW- july 2015 beach club
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Sorry no pics with this update. I will make up for it later.
I know that I said up next would be past trips but I decided to change it. How this trip came about. We bought into BLT last year while we were there. We already knew we weren’t going to use our points & bank them so we could take a great vacation in 2010. We booked the bounce back offer for CBR to stay for 12 days/11nights.
Change #1
Well in Feb we decided that we would stay one night at BLT then move over to CBR. Sound like a great plan right. So my mom got on the phone the first day you could reserve BLT to get a one night at BLT studio MK view we were all set. Right, nope not quite.
Change #2
Last year when we came home my cousin came up & saw all the stuff we had gotten there. I priced out for her to go with us. She didn’t think she could afford it. She graduates from nursing school Oct 1st. She is suppose to staying with our dog & house sitting while we are gone. The wonderful people at Disney sent me an email with a little thing called pincode offer. After doing some Disney Math as we like to call it. We decide to do the offer for Poly we booked Oct 5th-17th because we weren’t sure how airfare was going to fall plus we still have that one night at BLT.
Change #3
My cousin comes over & we tell her our news. She like are you serious. She tells us she thinks she might be able to afford it now. Here her dad never filed her taxes the year before. She never received her return or stimulus check & got that this year with her regular check gave her extra moolah. So I call WDW add her on to our ressie.
Change#4
We took off the 17th.
Change #5
We decided not to stay at BLT on the 5th because of having 5 people we didn’t want to use the extra points for a 1 bedroom. We are all set now right. Change #6 Think again, we still had our CBR ressie in my moms name so we called & had that transfer to the Poly with free food & go in on Oct 2nd. That came up to more money than we thought, my Disney math isn’t working to good by this point.
Change#7
We decided to just cancel that ressie & use the one we have with the pincode. I know so confusing imagine planning all of this. So we get airfare & were set. It came time to make ADR & we make them with my reservation. OK so we are doing well. Everything seems to be good.
Change #8
In July we get a phone call from my sister-in-law. See my brother & his kids were supposed to go with us this year. Long story short it didn’t happened. She asks my dad if we are planning on booking our trip for next year while we are down there. My dad tells her usually that what we do. My mom calls her back to find out that she wants to book a trip for my bother & the kids for their Christmas present. My mom gets the details & finds out she wants them to go with us for the same amount of time. Well that going to be a problem because we are planning on staying at BLT & they can’t afford to stay there. Plus we can’t bank points for the next two years. I have a great idea. Why don’t we stay at BLT this year & go to the CBR next year with my brother & kids. Oops one problem when we decided not stay that one night at BLT my mom went ahead & banked our points. A couple of days later we get on the phone & call our DVC rep Brad Smith he is great. She tells him the problem on Friday. He said he is going to try to get them unbanked then ask my mom where we want to stay. She told him 1bd at BLT MK view. For a second choice BC we need a 1bd because there is 5 of us. We get a phone call Sat afternoon he tells us that it was crazy there & he didn’t get a chance to work on it but he just sent a email to person who could make it happen. He also gave my mom his cell phone number so if we have any question to call him. Well on Monday we got a call he was able to unbank our points & get a 1bd at BLT but with LV. He has the room on hold for us we just need to call & give them all the info. We call get everything set up we are good to go with a 1bd at BLT LV. We get put on waitlist for MK view but no luck on that. So are you as tired as I am. I thought that from all the changes that name of the pre trip report is right on.
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