DREAMing of a Disney spring break COMPLETED - Page 21 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Ooooh, in that last photo of Mark. is that an interactive picture/ships wheel? How cool!
it was - sorry I forgot to mention that bit. That was a lot of fun to do. You had to steer what you saw in the picture to get the treasures. Very cool.
I'll tackle it, Dawn... Art Nouveau came first--flowing, ornate designs. Think the French Folies Bergeres Posters. Art Deco is more streamlined and architectural. Think Empire State Building.
Thank you! I knew someone here would be able to tell the rest of us!
All caught up! Sure seems like you guys are enjoying yourselves! The ship doesn't seem as crazy busy as it was on embarkation day. I am eager to hear your opinion of this as time goes on. Your pictures are awesome!
I have to be honest, after embarkation and the sailaway party, it never felt that busy again, which was a relief to me!
: it's a case for us of "been there, done that" and had no strong desire to go again. As it was a new ship, we figured we'd much rather spend our time exploring her!
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.
it was - sorry I forgot to mention that bit. That was a lot of fun to do. You had to steer what you saw in the picture to get the treasures. Very cool.
Now that sounds totally cool! Must try this out when I finally sail on the Dream! And as always, your pictures are beautiful!
Friday 15 April – part five: time to go professional
We headed next up to decks 11 and 12 to have a look around. There were some wonderful views of the other cruise ships (let’s face it guys, ours is better than yours! ), Nassau and Atlantis. It really was an absolutely perfect day weather wise, despite the long range forecast having originally said that we could have rain today.
Note the big insect bite on my arm...
Although this ship is packed, there are still areas that are pretty quiet, as you can see – we found this on deck 13 at the front. It’s all adults only as well.
We stopped off at Waves bar to get a drink. I got a Pina Colava, which was much better than yesterday’s drinks, while Mark got a Bud Light lime. He liked it at first, but said towards the end that he wasn’t enjoying it as much any longer.
The line for the AquaDuck was still insane at 40 minutes, but that was less than yesterday. I would like to do this, but there is no way that I can stand in line for that long, so we went down to deck three to guest services to ask when the best time to do it would be. They reckoned before midday tomorrow, so I think the plan will be to go ashore to Castaway Cay as early as we can and then have a few hours there and then head back when it gets hot. Hopefully, the lines won’t be too bad by then.
We headed back to the room for some downtime and found a couple of episodes of Castle that we hadn’t seen, so we watched those.
We headed out just after 5pm, as we wanted to get some professional photos done. Well, it would be more accurate to say that I wanted to get some done... The lines to see Mickey and Minnie were insane, but the line for the professional shots didn’t look too bad. There were only about four or five groups in front of us, but despite that, it took forever. It didn’t help that they were late getting going, not starting until about 5.30pm, instead of 5.15pm. By the time we were finally seen, it was almost 6pm and were late for dinner. Hopefully the final version of the shots will be worth it, although we did feel like chumps having them done. Mark was cursing me the whole way through.
So was it worth it? You decide...
We finally made it down to dinner at the Enchanted Garden and both had an appetiser just so we could say that we had sampled dinner there.
I went for the North Atlantic lobster ravioli, after Fasian recommended it and it was very good and quite light.
Mark had the Ahi Tuna and avocado tower and he told me that it was very good as well.
It was very hard to sit there and not eat, while everyone else was. At one point, I went to see if Shutters was open, but it wasn’t.
Ciaran seemed very active this evening and again for a lot of the meal, he didn’t use his DS, although towards the end, he did and then he was showing the other boy how to use it, which was quite sweet.
Ciaran showing off his FULL autograph book to a jealous Mark!
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The professional pictures of you two turned out nicely. The expression on Mark's face in the first one, though, cracked me up. I think can read 'I can't believe you're making me do this!'
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: it's one of the many free activities offered on board. 
it was - sorry I forgot to mention that bit. 
That was a lot of fun to do. You had to steer what you saw in the picture to get the treasures. Very cool. 
The lines to see Mickey and Minnie were insane, but the line for the professional shots didn’t look too bad. There were only about four or five groups in front of us, but despite that, it took forever. It didn’t help that they were late getting going, not starting until about 5.30pm, instead of 5.15pm. By the time we were finally seen, it was almost 6pm and were late for dinner. Hopefully the final version of the shots will be worth it, although we did feel like chumps having them done. Mark was cursing me the whole way through. 
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