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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Cori (DD), Robert (DD's boyfriend), and I spent a night at WDW the weekend of October 4th with one thing in mind...Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party!
Early on, when plans were first shaping up, we weren't sure if my hubby, Russ, would make the trip. In order to be certain we had enough beds to go around, we booked a cabin over at Ft. Wilderness. (This, of course, made Cori a happy camper...no pun intended...as she loved our previous stay here.) Alas, Russ had been having a bad week (like he ever has a good week!) so he decided to stay behind and hold down the fort at home with the furbabies. The three of us party-goers decided to leave around 11 a.m. instead of our usual early departure since we felt bad leaving behind my sweetie. We figured this would give us time to grab lunch along the way, check-in, veg for a few minutes, then get ready for MNSSHP.
As it turned out, we pulled into Ft. Wilderness between 2 and 2:30 p.m. Our cabin was ready, and off we went to 2233. Loved this location! It was on the interior part of the loop, which meant no roadway behind us!
Prior to leaving Jacksonville, I had baked cupcakes to take down with us since Cori’s birthday was just three days after the party. We had a little celebration before breaking out the costumes and getting ready for our first adventure at MNSSHP! Surprisingly enough, all three of us were able to get ready fairly quick and we were on our way over to the Magic Kingdom by 5 p.m.
The bus stop was right at the end of our loop, and within just a few minutes (actually a few seconds!) the bus pulled up and off we went. Along the way, Cori was the subject of many odd stares from the younger crowd, and quite a few chuckles from the older crowd. At the marina, as we waited for our ferry to MK, we were beginning to wonder if we would be the only people dressed up for the party! Seriously, not even the kids were dressed up. But, being the nut cases that we are, this was not a concern for us. We arrived at the MK entrance around 6 p.m. and were given our wristbands for the party upon entering. An older gentleman put on my wristband and I kept telling him it was too tight, but he kept assuring me it wasn’t, and it was only his finger making it seem like it was tight. Needless to say I was right, and for the rest of the evening was stuck with a glove on my hand!
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First things first for Cori…she wanted a birthday button. With that in place, we meandered down Main Street and decided to head over to Haunted Mansion. A 20 minute wait was posted, and we walked right in. As we were exiting the mansion some girl gasped and said to Cori, “What happened to your head?” Ummm…hello! Note the birds all over the costume…not real. Cori explained this to the girl who was quite embarrassed, poor thing. (Turned out Cori’s costume was quite the hit the entire evening. She received many, many, MANY compliments on it, and several people asked if they could take her picture, which she always obliged.) And happily there were several other folks dressed up for the night! Next stop was Big Thunder Mountain Railroad…
…where I had a few costume malfunctions. First, I was having a heck of a time keeping my cigarette holder in my hand. It seems my gloves were quite slippery and every time I went to move the holder it just slipped right out of my grasp. We chased it around all evening and I couldn’t wait for the moment I lost the darn thing (which unfortunately never happened!). Well, as we were going down the final slope of the queue near the loading area, I was gabbing away with Cori using my usual animated hand motions. I swung the holder, and lo and behold the silver tip at the very end (which was quite a lightweight piece of thing in the first place) went flying off, flew through the air, hung a few seconds, then fell down on the crowd below in the holding area. Oops! That holder was going to be a thorn in my side no matter what! Once we boarded our train I figured I would finally have a breather (trying to keep things in my hands, in addition to holding onto my boa was no less than trying my patience…which thankfully I have a lot of so no problem there!). Not a chance for a breather though! Being by myself, I slid back and forth across the seat, breaking my “pearl” strand in the midst of all this. Seeing how these were not quite oyster-worthy pearls, they stayed together on the strand and all I needed to do was tie a knot with the strand for the rest of the night. (Anyone who knows me well knows this entire series of mishaps is not so unusual…I am the epitome of a klutz so it was all fitting.)
Being close to Pirates, we decided a ride through the Caribbean was necessary and we walked right on this also. Exiting, we found the time was just past 7 p.m. Party has started! We found a few candy stops along our way back to the main hub, and I immediately thought of Sharon’s mom as we trick-or-treated our way through the lines.
It had been several hours (around 7 or 8 to be exact) since we ate lunch, and the troops were getting antsy. We took our chances with Cosmic Rays seeing how they have the different pods. Unfortunately the sandwich pod was closed, so we were left with the choice of the chicken pod or burger pod. I chose the BBQ pork sandwich. Of course I did not keep in mind the glove situation (on my right hand no less!) when I ordered this. Cori, always on the ball she is, grabbed a fork for me and I was able to eat my sandwich left-handed. It still tasted good!
Now at this point I can’t quite remember what we did, but we ended up going through Alice’s treat party, where every barrel we came upon had CMs deciding to celebrate Cori’s birthday by shoveling two-fistfuls of candy into her bag! No kidding, this girl ended up with more candy than you can imagine! Not that she was complaining or anything. (She could give Sharon’s mom a serious run for her money with her sweet tooth!)
There was no wait for Space Mountain, but Robert isn’t big on roller coasters, and Cori was concerned her bird would fall off her head, so we bypassed it for Buzz. Robert went alone, and managed to clobber both Cori and me…combined! Our onride photo was hilarious (I’m kicking myself for not buying it) mainly because I had stuck that blasted cigarette holder in my mouth since both of my hands were occupied with shooting and spinning. Again, I cannot remember what we did at this point, but we somehow went through the hub again…
…and went through Fantasyland, where we met up with Tigger and Piglet! (The pictures the CM took with my camera did not come out well, so that one will definitely be one of the Photopass purchases.) As we passed through Liberty Square, a Dream Squad CM spotted Cori’s birthday button and shouted at the top of his lungs, “IT’S CORINA’S BIRTHDAY EVERYONE! HOW ABOUT WE ALL SING HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO HER?” Out of nowhere appeared a quartet of the most pitiful looking guys, who broke out into the most sullen version of Happy Birthday you could ever imagine. Absolutely hilarious!
The serenade went on for about 5 minutes, and seriously had me in tears I was laughing so hard. These guys were so getting into Cori’s costume, what with the birds and blood and all.
(I should add here we continued to load up on candy as we walked along…mine pretty much all ended up in a candy jar at work.)
Another walk around and through Adventureland, and the fireworks began. We caught a good part of the show from the area between Pirates and Pecos Bills (or somewhere in that area!) and decided this was actually a pretty good place to watch them. You certainly cannot see the entire show here, but we did see a good portion of it, and there were no crowds. Nice! Cori wanted to make another walk through Alice’s treat party (wonder why!), and scored big time again! Robert was just thrilled to have finally scored a bag of M&M’s.
It would soon be parade time, and I still wanted to take a peek in the Emporium. We made our way to Main Street and noticed the light crowds. What everyone says about the late parades at these parties is true. Definitely the way to go if you want to avoid large crowds. The parade was absolutely awesome!
I tried to get a picture of Jack Sparrow, but every time I took the shot, he turned away! Aaarrrgghh!
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Our evening pretty much ended here as I did not find anything in Emporium that just really caught my eye. It was late, we were tired from a long drive, and we knew we had another long drive the next day. Of course, once back at the cabin it took awhile for us to settle in for the night. Looking at the clock (which was close to 2 a.m.) I made a prediction I would wake up around 8 a.m. My body is like an alarm clock. It needs 6 hours of sleep, and I pretty much wake-up right on the money with that. Sure enough at 8 a.m. I was up for the day! Cori and Robert (who took the bunk beds in the room with me) were still sleeping like logs, so I called for late check-out and was given until noon. It worked out perfectly as we were back on the road home by 11:45.
All of us very much enjoyed MNSSHP and definitely look forward to enjoying this again in the future!
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Great night at the party. Lucky you, living so close that you can just pop in for a special party. The costumes were great. My wife and I did MNSSHP several years ago in costume as Renaissance era princess and prince. I agree about the props. It was difficult to manage the sword, the chain mail, the camera stuff and of course the Treat bag. Your pictures are great. I agree, the HM pics are really neat.
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