Cruising the Med with Mickey and the Crew **Updated 11/25** COMPLETE - Page 18 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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the colosseum looks amazing! is the ground floor missing on purpose (ie, to show the "basement" of the arena), or is it just gone after years and years of being exposed to the elements?
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Originally Posted by jpod523
the colosseum looks amazing! is the ground floor missing on purpose (ie, to show the "basement" of the arena), or is it just gone after years and years of being exposed to the elements?
Its missing... they have covered a small portion of it with that wooden area across from where I took the photos, but most has been left uncovered so that visitors can see the levels below.
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Great update with more wonderful photos! I realized reading your report that it's been almost FORTY YEARS since I was in Rome as a college student. Yikes!
TERRI, YOUR PICS ARE AMAZING, I LOVED HEARING ABOUT YOUR EXPERIENCE IN POMPEII, LOOKS LIKE YOU SAW SOME DIFFERENT THINGS THAN WE DID, SO THANKS FOR SHARING, BROUGHT BACK SOME GREAT MEMORIES. ISN'T IT JUST AMAZING ?? TERRI
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Rome - part 3
After the visit at the Colosseum, we headed for lunch near the Vatican. I took more photos of the city and the sights. I will see if I can get them all correctly labeled (in Salem w/o my Rome guides…). The forum The "Wedding Cake" Hadrien's Mosulem - now called Castel Sant'Angelo - if you read Dan Clark's "Demon's and Angels" - this was a featured location at the end of the book The enclosed walled walkway from the Vatican to Castel Sant'Angelo - the Pope's could use this as an escape method if necessary.
Add to that, when we arrived at the restaurant, I was so tired and hungry – I didn’t note the name of the place we ate, or take a picture of it – or of anything we ate – other than the gelato Looking up the palm-lined street in front of the restaurant at St. Peter's Basilica.
I told you I took a picture of my gelato!
It was a small Italian multi-level restaurant with photos of models on EVERY wall…. No one I recognized though. We were seated up on upper tier – and this was a way to get to know your fellow tour buddies… since we were practically sitting on top of each other. Lunch was a wonderful antipasto – 3 platers of it on each table, iced water, coke. The lunch was a lasagna and a veal (??) dish. Both were really good. I was very full and very satisfied. I didn’t even finish my gelato (and for those who know me well – I ALWAYS finish my ice cream!!!).
After lunch – we headed back out onto the streets of Rome and up the street to St. Peter’s Square – the Heart of Vatican City. Moon pointed out the Pope’s apartment and we all lined up to go through security and enter St. Peter’s Basilica. Now I should start this discussion that I am not Catholic. My mother may have been baptized Catholic – but she was not raised as a Catholic – so many of the nuances concerning saints are truly lost on me. The Protestants (Episcopalian and Lutherans) are not as big on all the saints. I know some of them by name (the big guys – Mathew, Mark, Luke – that crew) but the others… NOT A CLUE!! Of course St. Peter’s square is surrounded by statues of Saints… and me without my official Vatican issued Saints scorecard!! My Irish-Catholic grandfather is surely shaking his head right now….
The Pope's Apartment - middle row of windows.
The saints lining the colonade of the Square
The Obilisque in the square
More saints and more colonade
Fountain in the middle of the square
The Famous Swiss Guards - the Pope's personal protection group.
We lined up in the (what Moon told us) “short” line to enter. It was very much a “stay together, hang on to each other, keep up my people” event…. One woman behind me was complaining that Disney had not arranged proper queue lines and fast pass!!! Finally we arrived at the security area – and there were only 2 screening machines open – out of like 12!!!
The line to enter St. Peter's - we were told this was a "short" line
The front of St. Peter's. The screens are used to broadcast the services when the square is full
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And AMAZING pictures 
Finally we arrived at the security area – and there were only 2 screening machines open – out of like 12!!! 
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