Our Island Hopping, Rain Dropping, Champagne Popping Adventure - Page 11 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Glad you had a great time at the luau! Love the pics! Congrats to Maddie for going down the slide, but poor MD getting the brunt of the collision! What a great day you guys had!
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What a really nice day. Glad you liked the luau as I've heard mixed reviews as well. I have to laugh about the kids not touching each other as I tell Evan all the time. "Do not touch anyone with any part of your body" he is an only child but will constantly torture his cousins.
What a fun day! Jill, I continue to be so impressed by how thoughtful and loving your girls are with each other -- so sweet that Maddie wanted to get a Vinylmation for her sister to cheer her up!
I'm LOL at the photos of Maddie at the luau! She certainly was enjoying the food! I'm glad you had a good experience. The luau gets so many negative reviews, but I've never really understood why. We've been twice -- on our honeymoon in 1999 and again with the kids and my parents in 2009 -- and we enjoyed it both times, particularly learning about all the different native dances and Polynesian cultures.
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I'm glad to hear such a great review of the luau! I really want to try it, but I wasn't sure. I think I might have to somehow fit it in to our next trip!
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Mary Devall and I enjoyed back-to-back rides on ToT and I even had a new experience. When our elevator was dropping one time, I noticed a “ghost” on one of the ledges. Thinking I might be seeing things, I mentioned it to Mary Devall afterwards and she immediately made me feel slightly less by telling me “Yep. I’ve seen that before.”
Wow, that's really interesting! In all of my rides on ToT, I've never seen that!
Glad to hear a good review of the Luau. I think I may add it to our trip in April. One question though... is the Luau indoors? For some reason, I always thought it was outside.
Just got all caught up with your last few updates and I have to say that your girls are just so cute together. I loved the story about Maddie wanting to buy MD the vinylmation to make her feel happy again. My older daughter was also the perfectionist (still is most of the time) and my younger one just tried to have fun. I also enjoyed how Maddie is so into her plush animals and was tickled pink at winning them in Dinoland Glad to hear that you enjoyed the luau so much. We had done one in Hawaii on our honeymoon and thought it kind of boring but it sounds like Disney's was quite entertaining! I'm really looking forward to reading about the DCL coming up!!!
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We love SciFi for the atmosphere. The last time we looked, we thought the menu had changed and couldn't even find a burger unless it had a hot dog stuck in the middle of it. Sounds like they still have the burgers so we'll have to go back.
I haven't been to the Luau since 1982 - I think it was more adult-focused back then. I remember being chosen to get up and dance onstage.
One of the things we enjoyed when we lived just a couple of miles from WDW was to park at the Poly and walk past the Luau to the GC. It was fun soaking up the Luau atmosphere. Of course, this was all before they started construction on the GC DVC.
Your girls are adorable - love the pigtails and how Maddie digs into those ribs/chicken..
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Love the pics! Congrats to Maddie for going down the slide, but poor MD getting the brunt of the collision! 
What a great day you guys had! 
Holly: 
<--- Disney Fantasy 2016!
Melanie
by telling me “Yep. I’ve seen that before.”
Glad to hear that you enjoyed the luau so much. We had done one in Hawaii on our honeymoon and thought it kind of boring but it sounds like Disney's was quite entertaining!
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