Four Days Off Christmas Edition Complete 1/13/11 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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What an amazing dinner at Sanaa, it is on our list for October as I so want to try this as everything just sounds so delcious and everyone seems to have such great service.
Those cabs sometimes are the most best spent cash...just the ease of getting back to the room to relax is worth the cost of the cab.
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What an amazing dinner at Sanaa, it is on our list for October as I so want to try this as everything just sounds so delcious and everyone seems to have such great service.
Those cabs sometimes are the most best spent cash...just the ease of getting back to the room to relax is worth the cost of the cab.
Yes indeed, regarding the taxis. Especially, when it is late at night when you want to get back to your room and crash ASAP after a long day. Although, they're not cheap, convenience is the key!
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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!
To give you an idea of what it looked like when I left my room on the morning of my 4th day
It was still dark!!! It was also still cold. On this day I was wearing a sweatshirt, a tshirt and a turtleneck!
I made my way to the front desk and asked them to call me a taxi. And I waited, and I waited some more . . . and then a MK bus pulled up and I hopped on! The driver was nice enough to take me and the people we picked up at Music and Movies to the Contemporary. I ended up arriving at the Contemporary before my 7:20 reservation so I went up to Chef Mickey's and was through the check in line very quickly! Off to the plate!
Apparently Mickey is now back on the floor instead of at the plate!
I grabbed some food. The only thing that was particularly memorable was Goofy's Veggie Lasagna (yes at breakfast) It was REALLY good! The characters seemed to be moving along really quickly, but there were no handlers in sight. Nor was my waitress anywhere to be found.
So I took pictures of Goofy and Minnie. Minnie was really happy to pose for me!
Then Mickey skipped my table. Straight up just passed me by . . . I was crestfallen. Seriously folks--I had dragged myself out of bed in the dark to meet Mickey. A handler CM realized what had happened and after Mickey finished with the next table, he was directed back to me.
I asked the woman who was sitting at the next table over from me to take a picture.
Now the side story . . . just a few days ago I got a lovely private message from one of our members! (Hi Nicole!) Turns out she was the woman who took the above photo! She thought she recognized me, but couldn't figure out from where. She saw the PP button on my bag as I was leaving and found me on the boards when she got home! Thanks for taking the photo Nicole and hopefully next time we'll get to chat! Its always great to meet Passporters and if any of you happen to see me in the parks please introduce yourself--I might even buy you a FAB. I've made so many great friends over the years through the message boards! (Hi everyone!)
One more photo
I was finished with breakfast pretty quickly, I managed to miss Donald somewhere along the way, but wanted to get to MK early, early and park opening was 8am. I just missed the opening, but only by a few minutes.
Now I have to share my new touring strategy with you for busy park days. It was just two days before Christmas and the park was listed as being a 9 on Touring Plans. I figured it was going to be a mob scene. I still stuck by my 20 minute rule for most of the day. What I did was . . . I spent the morning crisscrossing the park, riding all of the rides that had less than a 20 minute wait and collecting FP for the headliners along the way. I'm not exactly sure what order I rode in . . . because my photos are a little jumbled. I do know that by noon I had FP for Space Mountain, BTMRR, Jungle Cruise, Peter Pan, and Winnie the Pooh. There would be no waiting in lines for me in the afternoon!
One of the very first things I did, after a first quick ride on Peter Pan, with a less than 10 minute wait was to go through the brand new queue for Winnie the Pooh. I took a bunch of photos to share with you!
The honey walls are really cool!
I took some photos of the ride as well:
I headed next to the tea cups with no wait at all
I know that I also rode the carousel while waiting for my next FP to open up. Not to use, but to store for later in the day . . . After getting a FP for Winnie the Pooh, which came with a FP for Philharmagic. I headed over to Tomorrowland. I rode Buzz Lightyear and had a little bit of time before my FP window would be open.
Next I met the man himself:
The line was short . . .
I also noticed that Chip and Dale were making there way out to the area near the Tomorrowland Stage:
I had a great time with these guys! It was starting to warm up so I had taken off my sweatshirt. My turtleneck had little holly berries on it and Dale started trying to eat my arm!!
I know I grabbed a FP for Space Mountain at this point. Its still really early in the morning at this point.
I crisscrossed the park again and had this taken on the way
but I didn't stop to watch because I was looking forward to trying out my camera on POTC in the dark, without the flash. This was a total experiment. Most of the shots didn't come out great, but I've got a few.
The flash accidentally went off on this one--you can see the difference for sure.
I know that I rode Haunted Mansion next because the wait really short--yes less than 20 minutes--especially since I noticed that the wait time around lunch time yesterday was well over an hour.
Only one photo worth showing:
This always reminds me of the MT Lot window on Main Street!
I know it was still early in the day because I met Tiana and Naveen shortly after 11am.
I really had a great time talking to them, especially after I told them that I was from New Orleans too. Tiana instructed me to make sure I sent everyone to her restaurant!
I think this is a good spot to stop for today . . .
My photobucket shots are uploading for the rest of the day . . .94 of them. (And I left a bunch out . . .this was the day that both my phone battery and my camera battery died)
So glad the CM got Mickey to come back to your table! The new queue for Winnie the Pooh looks so adorable. Princesses Tiana and Prince Naveen are two of our favorites now because of the super interaction with them back in June. They really have a good time chatting with the guests.
Great update and photos Heather. Glad you got to meet Mickey after he forgot your table. You got to accomplish so much in the MK after the opening. Good work and planning. It always helps!
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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!
So glad that you got a visit from Mickey, we seem to have had bad luck with Donald on our last two visits to Chef Mickeys. Love the strategy, for a busy day you sure got a lot done so far.
Great update! I love Tiana and Naveen. Easily my favorite "face" characters. Tiana is especially sweet, she loved the story of how David and I were high school sweethearts.
Your park strategy really works! You got so much done even for a low-level crowd day, I can't believe you did all that on a 9 day. How cool that it was a fellow PPer who took you pic at Chef Mickey's!
So many wonderful photos Heather - it looks like a great time at the Magic Kingdom! Thanks for sharing the photos of the new queue for Winnie the Pooh, I it, but my favourite shot is of the resort with the steam coming off the pool. That's a superb photo!
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Another great update. I love getting up that early for the parks & walking through the resort alone! I love when you get a great bus driver first thing in the morning! We had one like that last Jan & he took us right to GF for our GFC ADR.
Your touring strategy is just like ours! DH & I have better success with it,but when DD is with us we get a stroller so we can still hustle through the park
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Especially, when it is late at night when you want to get back to your room and crash ASAP after a long day. Although, they're not cheap, convenience is the key! 
The new queue for Winnie the Pooh looks so adorable. Princesses Tiana and Prince Naveen are two of our favorites now because of the super interaction with them back in June. They really have a good time chatting with the guests. 
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Thanks for sharing the photos of the new queue for Winnie the Pooh, I 
it, but my favourite shot is of the resort with the steam coming off the pool. That's a superb photo!
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