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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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I am entertaining the idea of going to US/IOA before our next Disney trip. I have been once, end May 1999 when I was 17. I don't remember too mcuh about it. Having 3 dd's I know we will be doing rides that I likely didn't do back then, and of course they've added WWoHP, etc since.
How many days do you need to do it justice? Two, one for each park? Three? So you can visit each once then revisit favs? I know we will be itching to get to Disney, so we won't spend too much time here.
Also, where do you recommend I learn about US/IOA? Thére isn't a passporter guide out there is there ? lol.
I have a lot of research to do that's for sure. Have to decide about staying on site, off site, express pass, etc etc etc.
Beyond Disney: The Unofficial Guide to Universal Orlando, SeaWorld & the Best of Central Florida has section on the two Universal parks. As well, the back portion of The Unofficial Guide: Walt Disney World 2013 has a section on Universal parks (map and review of various rides). I have both books.
Having gone a few years ago (loved WWoHP), I really liked staying on property because you can use your room key as an express pass. No extra fee. Not all rides have that option and the HP and the Forbidden Journey ride doesn't allow express passes. Unlike fastpass, use is unlimited as long as ride accepts express. As well, staying on property, we were allowed early entrance to WWoHP part of park. Personally, I enjoyed Islands of Adventure more than Universal Studios, although I also found fun things to do in Universal.
I stayed at Loews Royal Pacific Resort (cheapest of three resorts)--closest to IoA. Gorgeous hotel. Don't know anything about Hard Rock Hotel or Loews Portofino Bay Hotel. Just that they are more expensive.
From Royal Pacific, we could take a boat or just walk (there is a walkway that runs along the waterway) to the two theme parks and CityWalk. Think there is a bus that can drop you off but the watertaxi is faster, I'd think. We usually ate dinner at sit-down restaurants in CityWalk and walked around (lots of shops, movie theater, and live bands when we were there in September time frame) before walking back to our hotel at night. The walkway is lit. If you are staying on-property, you get "next available" seating at CityWalk eateries. Wish they did that at Disney. We were just two, so we never waited long anyway.
Also, the resort offered a free bus (have to sign up for it day before, I believe) that will take you to SeaWorld. We did that too. Lots of fun. Hope this helps.
Beyond Disney: The Unofficial Guide to Universal Orlando, SeaWorld & the Best of Central Florida has section on the two Universal parks. As well, the back portion of The Unofficial Guide: Walt Disney World 2013 has a section on Universal parks (map and review of various rides). I have both books.
Having gone a few years ago (loved WWoHP), I really liked staying on property because you can use your room key as an express pass. No extra fee. Not all rides have that option and the HP and the Forbidden Journey ride doesn't allow express passes. Unlike fastpass, use is unlimited as long as ride accepts express. As well, staying on property, we were allowed early entrance to WWoHP part of park. Personally, I enjoyed Islands of Adventure more than Universal Studios, although I also found fun things to do in Universal.
I stayed at Loews Royal Pacific Resort (cheapest of three resorts)--closest to IoA. Gorgeous hotel. Don't know anything about Hard Rock Hotel or Loews Portofino Bay Hotel. Just that they are more expensive.
From Royal Pacific, we could take a boat or just walk (there is a walkway that runs along the waterway) to the two theme parks and CityWalk. Think there is a bus that can drop you off but the watertaxi is faster, I'd think. We usually ate dinner at sit-down restaurants in CityWalk and walked around (lots of shops, movie theater, and live bands when we were there in September time frame) before walking back to our hotel at night. The walkway is lit. If you are staying on-property, you get "next available" seating at CityWalk eateries. Wish they did that at Disney. We were just two, so we never waited long anyway.
Also, the resort offered a free bus (have to sign up for it day before, I believe) that will take you to SeaWorld. We did that too. Lots of fun. Hope this helps.
Thanks for all your tips. Def helps!
Quote:
Originally Posted by jimmymac
You can easily spend a day at each park. Many of the rides at IOA are pretty intense. How old / tall are DD?
The intense rides are one reason we haven't went yet. I am thinking this trip would take place in 2014. At that time my girls will be 13, 9, and 7. Currently my dd11 is over 5ft. dd7 is close to 48in and dd5 is around 44 I think. Of course we are speaking two years down the road so they will be taller then. Even though oldest dd has been tall enough to ride all rides at Disney since our first trip (she was 8) she wouldn't. She hasn't ridden space, tower, RnR, Everest, etc. She's way too scared. She has ridden splash but hates it b/c of the "falling"feeling in her tummy. Typing all that out makes me question going to US/IOA at all? What's your honest opinion? Waste of money?
I agree with Jimmymac about intense rides. The Hulk, in particular, is crazy intense. There is a Dr Seuss area of park and Jurrasic area has hands-on discovery center. Toon Lagoon has water rides.
The year we went, we came off Mummy (at Universal Studios) and a lady asked if we'd like to watch a tv pilot and critique it. We were paid about $10 a piece. Between the two of us, we had enough to pay for lunch. My husband also signed us up to be in audience with Steve Harvey and the Family Feud. Never again. All you do is clap and they even critique how well you do it during commercial breaks: speed it up, slow it down, do it this way. I wouldn't recommend for little kids--too boring. The park was closed by the time they let us out and another group was queued to come in and replace us!
The intense rides are one reason we haven't went yet. I am thinking this trip would take place in 2014. At that time my girls will be 13, 9, and 7. Currently my dd11 is over 5ft. dd7 is close to 48in and dd5 is around 44 I think. Of course we are speaking two years down the road so they will be taller then. Even though oldest dd has been tall enough to ride all rides at Disney since our first trip (she was 8) she wouldn't. She hasn't ridden space, tower, RnR, Everest, etc. She's way too scared. She has ridden splash but hates it b/c of the "falling"feeling in her tummy. Typing all that out makes me question going to US/IOA at all? What's your honest opinion? Waste of money?
Hulk Coaster, Dr. Doom, Spiderman, Forbidden Journey and the coasters are all way, way more intense than anything at WDW. There is plenty of other things to do, but those rides make IOA special have you considered SeaWorld and Busch gardens? Both are fuil day adventures that the kids would probably love
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We did about a day in each park, but had the hoppers so we did WWoHP twice --once to ride once for breakfast. The parks are so close it's easy to move between them.
We stayed at an off site partner hotel, so got the early entry benefit and Three Broomsticks breakfast that came with booking through Universal. It was an off time so we didn't need the front of the line privileges. Saved us a bundle -- three nights off site was less than one in an onsite hotel, so we didn't mind paying for parking.
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I wouldn't recommend for little kids--too boring. The park was closed by the time they let us out and another group was queued to come in and replace us!
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