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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Yay!!! I'm glad the CD is finally here, but it's hard to imagine what kept it so long. Thanks for being so awesomely considerate! (Really, it's much easier this way)
So glad your photos finally arrived, and glad you were so awesomely considerate. I wouldn't have been able to scroll back through (OK, not that I wasn't able, I just wouldn't have! ).
It was pizza for lunch today, and there were several varieties. Pizza in Rome is especially thin-crusted, almost like crackers (well, not really like crackers, but thin and crispy). There were several varieties, meat and veggie. I didn’t take a photo of every kind.
And dessert was interesting. They didn’t tell us what it was, and nobody I asked knew, so I asked Stefano, who happened to be standing nearby. He found out it was a Neapolitan ricotta cake. I’m not the biggest fan of cheesecakes of any kind, but I tried a few bites and it wasn't bad.
Lunch was a lot of fun. I think our waiter proposed to one of the girls on our trip. I noticed that suddenly she was standing up next to him with a napkin “veil” on her head. The funny part is that her parents were seated at my table and we didn’t have much of an idea of what was going on until we left the restaurant. A good time was had by all!
After lunch: more walking! This was a very busy day (and having done the trip, I much preferred having this be day 2 instead of the day 1 the way it normally is). We walked to the Spanish Steps.
We walked down Via Condotti, past a bunch of designer shops.
The Spanish Steps were even more crowded than before.
We were given a little time to explore and maybe visit a shop or two, but since I’d done most of the stuff already, I just hung out and watched the flower shovers. Also, I filled my water bottle (just like my BFF Samantha Brown did on her show, from this exact same fountain, in fact ).
Tina demonstrates
Next stop: the Trevi fountain (and I tossed in another coin, so I guess that means two trips back to Rome!).
And finally we came to the Pantheon. One thing I loved about Rome is most of the stuff you couldn’t see from miles away. In fact, some of it was less than a block away and you couldn’t really tell.
The Pantheon is peeking out there at the end of the block!
Ta-da!
I loved the Pantheon. It was awesome. Awesomer than a lot of the awesome stuff I’d already seen. The Pantheon is the best preserved building of ancient Rome. It’s hard to believe it’s over 1,900 years old! Stefano told us there used to be a grand approach to it and a huge staircase. It’s still there, but the ground level has risen with time and now the stairs are buried.
The inside was even more impressive. This was built in about 126 AD! Amazing!
Plus it’s got that whole geometrically-perfect thing going for it. 126 AD!! It’s not like they could look up how to build it on the Internet or anything.
And the oculus, which is the only source of light.
The oculus also lets in rain , but the floor is sloped and also has drainage holes. The guys that built this were really smart and junk!
The Pantheon is also a church, and the tomb of some Italians you may have heard of, like that guy Raphael, are here as well.
The Pantheon was really impressive. It was truly one of the highlights for me. We’ve come a long way in a couple of millennia, but in some ways, we haven’t advanced that much at all.
We made our final stop of the day in Piazza Navona.
We had to say goodbye to Stefano, since this was the end of our time with him. But first…
SPOILER! If you don’t want to be spoiled, skip to the next post. We got a little surprise from Marco and Tina. Gelato! I wasn’t complaining about that. Today, I figured out I could taste more if I got two flavors (though that made choosing a bit harder as I wanted flavors that complemented each other). I went with a classic – chocolate and hazelnut, and it was quite good.
Those who wanted to stay and explore around Piazza Navona were welcome to do so (and the guides were there to help them with restaurant choices and directions). I decided I was ready for a little break, so I headed back with the group. On the bus, we talked about our next day. We’d be leaving Rome for Tuscany, so our luggage needed to be outside our rooms by 7:30 (breakfast began at 7). We wouldn’t be seeing our bags until we got into our rooms in Artimino, so anything we needed before then (after 5 p.m.), we should bring with us. The guides gave us extra luggage tags if we needed them and came around to everyone to ask how many bags they’d be sending. It was up to us to check out in the morning and be ready to leave at 8:30.
I was wanting to do a little shopping, so I decided to walk the Via Del Corso and grab something to eat along the way.
Up Next: A solo evening
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Mickey's so happy to see me back, he can barely contain himself!
I'm so with you about the Pantheon. I was just stunned by how they built in so perfectly all those years ago and it's one of the things that stood out for me in Rome.
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Great photos...and thanks for being so awesomely considerate. 
Donna
).
I noticed that suddenly she was standing up next to him with a napkin “veil” on her head. 
). 
It’s not like they could look up how to build it on the Internet or anything. 
, but the floor is sloped and also has drainage holes. The guys that built this were really smart and junk! 
We got a little surprise from Marco and Tina. Gelato! 
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