Rain, Sunshine & Cupcakes ~ June 24 - July 3 - Page 3 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Great start and you made it safe and sound.
The gum thing is just nasty. I don't know why people do that. I always tell myself it has to be kids. No adult would do that. Yeah, right.
Can't wait for more.
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Yay, you are on your way!! Sounds like things are mostly going smoothly. I have to admit that I'm giggling a little bit at the thought of you doing a one-legged dance in the airport bathroom while holding a flip flop and trying not to fall over. But I hear you about not wanting to put your bare foot on the floor. Yuck!
Looking back I have to admit it is kind of funny!
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Originally Posted by KMB733
Great start!!! Glad you landed in Orlando, can't wait for the adventure to start!!
Thanks!
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Originally Posted by honeybee723
Great start! I don't like my bare feet touching unknown or public bathroom floors either...yuck!
I don't like my feet touching anything unknown either: public bathroom floors, dirty carpets, wet towels or rugs. Yes, I have many quirks.
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Originally Posted by bfth
Can't wait to read more!
More coming soon!
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Originally Posted by nursemom
This sounds like a fun TR. can't wait to hear more!
Thanks!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Colexis Mom
Great start!
Thanks!
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Originally Posted by lazanya
Great start! Sorry about the gum stuck on your flip-flop. So gross, why do people think that the ground is a trash can??
Yes and the thing is I've seen worse things on the floor.
Quote:
Originally Posted by dwonderz
Great Start! Can't wait for more!
Thanks!
Quote:
Originally Posted by mommapants
great start, except for the gum. I'm with you on public restrooms they are all gross. My son uses the stall next to me and then I'll see him down on his hands and knees looking under the wall at me (he is 5). I'm like "get up off the floor it's full of germs" - gross.
That's funny!
Quote:
Originally Posted by disneydreamer33
Great start and you made it safe and sound.
The gum thing is just nasty. I don't know why people do that. I always tell myself it has to be kids. No adult would do that. Yeah, right.
Can't wait for more.
We collected our carry-ons and got off the plane. We had to take a bathroom break because Adriel needed to go, after all he’d only gone twice in the plane . After visiting the loo, we headed towards the shuttle. Of course, being the planner that I am, I knew exactly where we were headed. We made over to DME only to find the mother of all crowds. Wow, there were a lot of people waiting for the busses. I showed our booklet to the CM and she directed us to our line (the last one by the way). While in line I noticed it was raining outside and I also learned that the busses were a little backed up because there’d been an accident somewhere along the way. We finally made the third bus of that line at 4:15 pm. I wasn’t able to score a front row seat because the family before us sat there.
After everyone boarded, we were on our way. It was raining pretty hard, but I thought that a little rain on our first day wouldn’t harm us. Soon enough, we were passing under that wonderful gate. No picture because I wasn’t sitting up front. And you know what? The family that sat there didn’t even take a picture of the gate. Oh well!
Speaking of that family, it was the mom, dad, grandma, 2 kids and a baby. Well the grandma was holding the baby and he was crying the whole trip. Not a little whimper but a full on cry fest. The grandma kept rocking him, trying to calm him with no success. The mom was sitting on the row across from them and she never even attempted to take the baby or try to find out what was wrong. Maybe he was hungry or cold, I don’t know. The thing is, the mom didn’t seem to care.
We were the last stop of the route. We stopped first at the Yacht Club, then the Beach Club and then the Boardwalk. I had to keep telling Arben and the kids “no this isn’t our hotel” each time we entered one. We finally arrived at Port Orlean’s Riverside.
We waited for our suitcase, tipped the driver and headed inside. I couldn’t believe we were really there. They were remodeling the lobby so they had prepared a small area for check-in. There was a short line but it moved quickly. Check-in went smoothly, we got building 28. After getting directions from the CM, we were heading to our room. On the way there it started raining. Rain and not knowing where the heck you’re going are not a great combination. On top of that I had Arben nagging about when we were getting to the room.
After getting lost once, we finally found our room. We opened up and settled in. I told everyone to freeze, as I wanted to take pictures of the room while it was still decent looking.
Abniel claiming his bed
While we were in line at the airport I overheard some people talking about a tropical storm. So after we settled into our room I turned on the tv to see what was happening. Indeed there was a tropical storm, Debby, heading towards Florida. Oh great! I was kicking myself for not checking before leaving our house. Not that I could do anything about it, but I could've prepared for it. We didn’t even have ponchos!
We were kind of hungry and wanted to get some food. Our plan was to head to DTD and eat at Wolfgang Puck Express. Because of the rain we couldn't do it, so we just decided to go to Riverside Mill. It was drizzling but half way there the rain got a bit stronger.
Since I had done my homework, I knew how the dining plan worked. We each got our food and mugs and went to pay. We settled down to eat.
I guess Adriel was hungry.
My food: fish & fries with a chocolate brownie.
Arben's food: bacon cheeseburger with fries and carrot cake.
Abniel and Adriel each had: pepperoni pizza with chocolate chip cookie and grapes
AJ had: cheese pizza and chocolate brownie.
A moment of no rain. Of course it started again the moment we stepped outside.
After stuffing ourselves we headed to the room. Our luggage arrived around 8:30. We showered, put our pjs and settled in our beds. The gang fell asleep as soon as their heads hit the pillows. I watched tv for a while but at 10:15 I turned it off. We needed our sleep as tomorrow was an early morning for us.
Ok, I know this is a weird thing for me to notice -- but since when do DME buses have seat belts? I've never noticed that before!
I'm glad you made it to Disney! I hear you about losing your way at POR. The only time we ever stayed there, DH and I arrived separately (I was already in Orlando for work and he met me there). I got to the hotel first, found the room, and walked around a bit. I texted him when I knew he was on his way from the airport and just told him to meet me in the main lobby, because there was no way I could describe to him how to find our room!
Glad you made it and no more gum incidents! Love all your pics! Our room looked just like that. Made me wish we were there now! Love that you got food pics. I never remembered to get them. Sorry you had to deal with a tropical storm.
Sorry about Debby.
I hear you about getting lost at POR. I've stayed there twice now and still get so confused and turned upside down finding my way around!
I'm glad you're there! I know you can get turned around at first, but you'll get it down. It's so beautiful there. I miss it! Looks like a great meal and a great start!
You guys arrived the same day we did! I had never used DME before this trip but I couldn't believe how many people were waiting in line! It took almost three hours for us to get a bus! It was also raining very heavily by time we landed! Glad you made it safely!
How did I miss this??? I have been waiting to see when you would start your TR. I saw that Debbie was going to be making a visit while you were there Looks like you are gearing up for some damp days,but I am sure there will be some rays of sunshine in your report. Can't wait to hear more.
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But I hear you about not wanting to put your bare foot on the floor. Yuck!
Wow, there were a lot of people waiting for the busses. I showed our booklet to the CM and she directed us to our line (the last one by the way). While in line I noticed it was raining outside and I also learned that the busses were a little backed up because there’d been an accident somewhere along the way. We finally made the third bus of that line at 4:15 pm. I wasn’t able to score a front row seat because the family before us sat there. 
The grandma kept rocking him, trying to calm him with no success. The mom was sitting on the row across from them and she never even attempted to take the baby or try to find out what was wrong. Maybe he was hungry or cold, I don’t know. The thing is, the mom didn’t seem to care.
Rain and not knowing where the heck you’re going are not a great combination. 
On top of that I had Arben nagging about when we were getting to the room. 
of the room while it was still decent looking. 
I was kicking myself for not checking before leaving our house. Not that I could do anything about it, but I could've prepared for it. We didn’t even have ponchos! 
Our plan was to head to DTD and eat at Wolfgang Puck Express. Because of the rain we couldn't do it, so we just decided to go to Riverside Mill. It was drizzling but half way there the rain got a bit stronger. 
as soon as their heads hit the pillows. I watched tv for a while but at 10:15 I turned it off. We needed our sleep as tomorrow was an early morning for us.
Sorry you had to deal with a tropical storm.
Dana
bed! 
<--- Disney Fantasy 2016!
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