August and Everything After WDW - Trip Report - Thread 2 **Updated 11/1** COMPLETE - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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.
To post messages and ask questions, join our FREE community today and you'll get access to tools and resources not available to guests, such as our vacation countown timers, "living" avatars, private messaging system, database searches, downloads, and a special PassPorter discount code. Registration is fast, simple, and completely free. Just click the Join Our Community link.
If you think you've already joined, log in below now. If you don't remember your member name or password, please visit our Member Name and Password Recovery page. You are also welcome to contact us.
August and Everything After WDW - Trip Report - Thread 2 **Updated 11/1** COMPLETE
I just realized this a long update.... I do apologize for the length of words and lack of pictures....
Vinyl 1, Side 2: Friends Around the World (08:14:08)
So we're finally on day 2. Day 2 started off nice. The wake up call came, Andy got up and showered and then I got up. And I suddenly realized that my tummy wasn't appreciative of all the Orange Dreams, Italian beer, italian food, smores, etc. that it had ingested the day before. I was sick
The plan had been to get out to DHS for opening and to grab some early FPs for Toy Story Insania......but alas, this was not to be. My tummy kept me down for the count for about 2 hours.
I sent Andy to the giftshop to pick up something that I could take to make me feel better.....and what did he come back with for himself?????
A huge chocolate chip cookie the size of my head. It's one of those that's like as thick as a biscuit. When I go to Disney it's a requirement to have chocolate in the morning. So just b/c Melissa was having breakfast on the porcelain throne doesn't mean I couldn't enjoy myself.
You're so nice.
So anyway.... I finally started to feel better and we were able to head out, 2 hours later than planned. So we went down and caught a bus to DHS.
Feeling better.......
We got to the park and decided what the hey we'll just check out the chaos and see how bad the FP return time was. It was too late. So we knew we had to miss out today. But atleast we had been able to ride it last night. (and another good thing was that it didn't give Andy a chance to redeem himself and my fabulous buttkicking still stood.
Yeah maybe if I'd gotten you on there sick I would have beaten you!
Today was a rainy morning. But not too bad. Not like Forrest Gump rain where you couldn't go anywhere even with an umbrella without getting soaked. So we both popped our umbrellas open and took it easy.
We stopped first to get FPs for RnRC. Then we ducked into the Animation Academy to get out of the rain for a bit.
While we waited for the drawing session to begin we went and hung out with cardboard WALL-E. Why oh why isn't he really here yet?????
Andy gave him bunny ears. I didn't think that was very nice.
He would've thought it was funny.
We headed in for our drawing lesson and found out we would be drawing Mickey again. We've only drawn him once and that was our first ever visit. My Mickey kicked Andy's Mickey's butt back then. This Mickey was different though. Instead of being straight on, he was kind of looking to the side a little.
Andy getting ready to draw....
So we drew.....and I'm always proud of my picture.....until I look around and see how pitiful it looks compared to others. Then I look around some more...and see how incredible it looks compared to others....
What are you saying? You're not talking about mine are you? Mine was good! Wasn't it?
Yes we decided yours was better. I was saying mine was better than that little kid sitting next to me. Way to make myself feel better right? Compare myself to an 8 year old. My Mickey kind of ended up looking like baby Mickey.
After that my tummy had recovered enough to decide it was reeeallly hungry. So we headed over to the Tune In Lounge to grab some lunch at the bar. I was smart though, and refrained from ordering an adult beverage...I just stuck with Coke.
This is one of my favorite places to eat/hang out in all of Disney World. The staff there is always really nice. The bartenders know what they're doing, get your drinks fast, and the food is good.
I agree, it's a great place to relax, hang out, and helps create one of those moments of "I'm just be happy to be at WDW". One of those "taking it slow" kind of things.
We split the turkey sandwich for lunch and it was tasty as it had been before. We relaxed in there for a bit.
We had missed seeing Stitch at the hat, the times for them to come out were over. So we decided to go see Andy's favorite after lunch. We headed back to find Mike and Sully. The line wasn't long at all, but as soon as we got in it the CMs said that Sully would be taking a break in about 10 minutes. And only Mike would return. I was really sad....b/c I like Sully. Andy didn't care though, that greedy butt only cared about seeing Mike.
Side story...well not really side story....
It was a "behind us" story
Yes...behind us. This foreign fellow....he sounded Russian... called the CM over and said something to her that must've ticked her off b/c she just walked away and went into a CM only door.... and didn't come back for a few minutes.
So the line kept moving....Sully kept staying out..... and finally we were next in line. I figured he'd leave right as it was our turn.... and foreign fellow behind us calls over another CM and says something to the extent of "If my kids don't get to see them they'll be trouble"
Now you can take that comment one of two ways..... one way would be "If my kid don't get to see them my kid's gonna cause me a lot of trouble." The second way is "If my kid don't get to see them I'm gonna cause you a lot of trouble". Either way it's not a good comment to be making to a CM.
Yeah I'd say threatening a CM is not the wisest decision. I don't know what happened b/c it was our turn to go.....but I hoped.....even though it was ugly for the kids...I hoped they had to wait for the characters to come back out after we left.......
Anyway...here's our pics..
Sully attacked Andy while I pleaded for his life....
then we all made nice...
We decided to head over to the TOT to get in a ride before our RnRC FPs were ready. We came across a Green Army man on the way...
He was very polite.
The TOT proved to be a "scream". I was a little worried about riding after my morning battle with my stomach....but I figured I'd be fine. So we wait in a very short line.... and we get in the library. And you can always tell when there's people who have never ridden before.
The first thing they do is they walk in and look up and walk to the center of the room like they're getting on the Haunted Mansion or something. You can tell people that have ridden multiple times b/c they all head to the back corner of the room. The newbies also watch the tv very closely. I always get a little excited at this point b/c I know I can pull my "This is it" crap on the ride when it gets pitch black dark.
You're so nice. But it is funny.
So we end up on an elevator full of people freaking out. One little girl on the back row with her mom was scared to death. Hiding her face in her mom's arm. And then 20 something year old chick right behind us was freaking flipping out. Like I thought she might die from lack of breath from screaming.
Lack of oxygen to the brain
The whole time......every time we went UP, and everytime we DOWN....she screamed her freaking head off. It was so loud....but so funny. I kept looking back at her to see facial expression and it was one of pure terror. I guess that's why they call it the Tower of Terror.... ba dum ching You should've seen the ride photo. She was classic.
After TOT we headed over to use our FPs. The FP line was unusually long and the people behind us line commented on that fact. And then the lady behind us goes "Okay, so you're passporters right?" And we were like "whoa.....yeah" and she knew who we were....which was really cool! It was Patty and her husband and her kid(s) b/c I can't remember now if there was one boy or two.....for some reason I thought there was two.....but then I think no there was only one. I'm sorry Patty. You must clear this up for me. And I also am not sure of Patty's PP name, so Patty, clear that up for me, too.... I have a horrible memory. I basically write my TRs from looking at my pics. That's why I take so many pictures.
So anyway we chatted with them in line and soon we were getting in our limo. Oh wait, backing up a bit. During the little preshow Andy and I were discussing the possible rehab to this ride.
Wait, don't say rehab when you talk about Steven Tyler, Melissa.
Sorry, the possible refurb to the ride. And we both agreed that Aerosmith themselves needed to be refurbed in that film.
Mainly their hair and their clothes.
we're not knocking on Aerosmith.... we're just saying that we're pretty sure they'd appreciate an update to their look in that film.
So we had a fun, fast, crazy ride on the ride.. Fun as usual... and no upset stomach b/c of it. So I was all good
It was getting to be early afternoon so we decided to head back to the POFQ to take a break. When we got back I told Andy I was very very hungry again and wanted something baaad. Usually when I have an upset stomach and start to feeling better I just want to eat a bunch of junk. I just get a craving. So Andy went to the room to get our mugs while I waited to get some Beignets. When we got back with the mugs he told me a disturbing story
So when Melissa and I are by ourselves we don't really talk a lot b/c we're usually listening to other people's conversations. Maybe this is due to the fact that we've hung out with each other nonstop for over 10 years now. So we always tend to catch interesting tidbits of conversations in passing by other people. This one I caught by myself. Kid was walking from the pool mind you... saying "and poop and poop and water and water and poop and poop and water and water.... " Which left me with a little bad feeling about swimming in the days to follow. I don't mind the water, it's the poop that bothers me.
I don't know what the kid was talking about but it was a hilarious story.
Maybe he was talking about what Melissa was doing that morning...
Yeah that was really funny HAHAHAHA! Stupidhead.
We went back to the room and enjoyed our beignets. Then we decided to take a quick nap before heading out for a late night at Epcot and catching up with some friends!! (Yes Pom, this means you! )
PassPorter's Free-Book to Walt Disney World It’s hard to believe anything is free at Walt Disney World; but there are actually a number of things you can get or do for little to no cost. This e-book documents over 200 free or cheap tips to do before you go and after you arrive. You could save a considerable amount of money following these tips. Perhaps more importantly; you can discover overlooked attractions and little-known details most people whiz by on their way to spend money. Click here to see free sample pages from the e-book! Get this popular e-book free of extra charges when you join the PassPorter's Club for as little as $4.95. A club pass includes access to all our other e-books; e-worksheets; super-size photos; and more! This e-book is also available for separate purchase in the PassPorter Online Store for just $5.95.
Glad you were feeling better after a few hours and able to hit DHS....those crowds at TSMM are no joke....I just gave up checking FP times after a certain hour.
Lunch sounded good and glad your stomach did not act up....your elevator mates sounded hilarious on ToT.
Naptime sounded like a great way to prepare for your EMH evening...
Wonderful morning! Sorry it started off rough but glad you got to feeling better. That poop and water boy would have bothered me too but having a boy I do know that bodily functions are just funny to them so hopefully there was no truth to his statements!
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.
Sounds like you had a great time at the Studios, even though you arrived later than planned. Looking at your Monsters pictures, and remembering mine, why couldn't they have made that backdrop a little wider to block out the people who are entering and exiting the area? Anyway, great pics with Mike and Sulley. But do tell, did the Russians have to wait or did their threats work?
So we always tend to catch interesting tidbits of conversations in passing by other people. This one I caught by myself. Kid was walking from the pool mind you... saying "and poop and poop and water and water and poop and poop and water and water.... " Which left me with a little bad feeling about swimming in the days to follow. I don't mind the water, it's the poop that bothers me.
You guys crack me up! I'm lovin' the trip report...sorry you weren't feeling good, Melissa. Upset tummies can really put a crimp in your plans, glad you recovered quickly.
Now as for the "catching interesting tidbits of conversations"...I do this too! In May while using the restroom, I hear an adult woman's voice from the next stall over "Keeley, get your hand out of the toilet!" I also like to listen in (I don't call it eavesdropping) to the conversations around me in lines...oh the things people say!
Great update. Sorry to hear that you were having problems. WOW, not sure that the sight of a giant cookie would have made me feel better. I can hardly wait for more information---Will your record stand at TSMania? Will you be able to have another adult beverage? Will Fay stay away and let you enjoy yourself? I feel that you must be great with the kids at the library especially after seeing how you took care of Andy by keeping Sully from killing him. Bring on some more.
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.