A Baltic boating adventure TRIP REPORT COMPLETED 11/19 - Page 12 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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.
Saturday 4 June – part eleven: I’ll get you on that…
Finally, we were on our way back up from the Needles…
… taking our time to admire the various bits of footwear that didn’t make it back to the top with their owners!
I was fascinated by how the bushes here had grown. I guess they were swept back by the wind.
We had a look in the sand shop, but decided as we did this before, it wasn’t worth doing the same thing again. We also looked in the main shop, and got a fridge magnet, and Mark found a couple of cheap belts, so he was happy.
We saw the cows again on the way out…
… and we headed over to Yarmouth, where we were due to catch the ferry back from…
We figured it would be the same story as this morning, in that we’d check in, and they’d get us on the next available one. Well, sadly it wasn’t quite the same, and we were told in no uncertain terms that we wouldn’t be able to get on the 4:00pm, but to come back at 4:15pm and he’d “get us on that”.
As that was almost an hour away, Mark decided we’d drive to Cowes, so we set off…
After 15 minutes, I didn’t think we were getting very far, and I looked up our position on Google Maps. We were still so far away from Cowes, it just wasn’t funny. I figured we’d get there, and literally have to turn round and come back again, so what was the point? We turned around at that point, and made our way back to Yarmouth.
We parked up by the ferry terminal, and paid for half an hour’s parking, and headed into the harbour office, where they had restrooms, along with shower facilities. It was certainly packed with lots of useful facilities for boat owners. I have worked at somewhere before that had a marina, and this is much better than their facilities.
I wandered around and took a few photos…
… then we chilled in the car for a few minutes. Once we got to 4:10pm, we headed back over to the booth, and he sent us over to lane 4. We were the second car in line, and I figured we stood a reasonable chance of getting on the 5:00pm sailing.
As we sat there, we both commented how hot we were, and when we looked at each other’s faces, oh my goodness they were red! I could only assume we’d got wind burnt on the chairlift, and possibly the sailing on the way out this morning as well. It couldn’t be sunburn, given there really hadn’t been enough sun for that. I said to Mark that as we had 40 minutes until the next sailing, I’d go and see if I could find a chemist, and get some aftersun lotion, as guess what the one thing was we didn’t have with us (apart from our passports of course ) – you got it, aftersun lotion.
I headed off to explore, and immediately saw a chemist’s sign, and found the sweetest town…
I managed to pick up some aftersun lotion for cheaper than I can usually get through the major chain stores, so I was very pleased with that, and headed back to the car to wait for the 5:00pm ferry to come in. Let’s just say when we applied the aftersun, we immediately knew about it! It contained menthol, and it was very cooling, but it was also a bit of a shock to the system, but the most important thing was it did the trick.
The worst sunburn I ever had was earned on a completely cloudy day. The Rays that burn you are still present through the clouds. Hopefully you were feeling better after that slap of menthol.
I can't believe all the nautical flags on those boats. I've never seen so many on boats just sitting in a marina. Wonder if they were getting ready for some kind of regatta?
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.
The worst sunburn I ever had was earned on a completely cloudy day. The Rays that burn you are still present through the clouds.
Oh trust me, I do know that, it's just so rare to burn in this country on a cloudy day...
Quote:
Hopefully you were feeling better after that slap of menthol.
Oh my goodness that was just what we needed!
Quote:
I can't believe all the nautical flags on those boats. I've never seen so many on boats just sitting in a marina. Wonder if they were getting ready for some kind of regatta?
That's what we figured as well. They all seemed to relate to previous years and we reckoned this year's must have been about to take place.
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.
As it did, I spotted a bird, and was photographing him, when he took off!
Then we watched lots and lots of cars boarding…
We did ask one of the staff if we’d make it on. First, he said to us that it would be tight, then he changed his mind and said we should be fine. After a certain amount of time, they raised the decks with the first set of cars on – very surreal to watch.
We were told at one point to move up, and we got excited, but then they started to take more cars from the other lanes, which were the ones booked on this sailing. We were the first standby at this point. When those had boarded, we heard the radios say that they could take another six cars. Yay, we’re on!
It was exceptionally weird to drive under this, knowing this was another car deck above us…
We headed up to the passenger lounge…
…. and as I wasn’t getting the greatest photos through the window, I headed up to the sun deck to get some shots from there as we sailed away.
We saw this guy, who was struggling to right his boat. I understand from something one of the other passengers said that he did get it righted in the end.
Finally, the sun was shining:
Before we knew it, we were seeing the mainland. This trip seemed to be even shorter than the one we took this morning. We came into a beautiful harbour…
We made our way off the boat…
… and into the New Forest…
We did see some ponies…
I didn’t take many photos after that, as I got on with the trip report, and Mark put his feet down. I figured I didn’t want to know what sort of speed we were doing.
I did get the bonus of seeing some of my friends along the M25…
We made it home by 7:50pm, which was really good going. The first thing I did was check the passports were there, and yes, they were. Phew! I just had completely forgotten them and they had stayed in their safe place all along. We hauled everything inside, and then ordered dinner. We had take away, with me getting pizza, and Mark getting kebab, and we caught up on a couple of things on the TV, before heading to bed. We’d be heading back where we’d come from tomorrow morning, but at least this time, we’d be armed with our passports, and finally able to head off on our cruise…
The weather today was dry, but cloudy and humid, with temperatures in the low 20s. The best thing today was spending the day on the Isle of Wight. The worst thing today was leaving the passports at home. Today we tried visiting Osborne House And the result was it’s a stunning place, and well worth seeing. The most magical moment today was our ferry crossing over to the Isle of Wight.
Mental note should Chez ever come to visit... tell all local "chemists" to stock up as Chez will be making multiple trips during her visit! My goodness, between Mark's ear, his ankle, and your sunburn, you were quite the boon for local business.