A Little Trans-Atlantic Magic - The (somewhat) LIVE TR! -updated 07/03/13 - Page 29 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Your report is amazing, I love every detail..every picture!
I live in Orlando and my parents live in The Villages. They absolutely LOVE The Villages, it's an amazing place to live. Let me know if I can be of any help to you, and if you need a tour guide, I bet my parents would love to show y'all around!
So many updates! I know I had other comments to make, but the photos of Palo brunch wiped everything else out of my head. I love how they try to give you the same server for all your Palo meals. At first I thought it was coincidence, but it happens too often for it to be unplanned. They probably can't always manage it, but it's nice. I'm excited
to see the photos from Funchal, but very sad, because it means the cruise is drawing to an end.
I know! Hard to believe that the time has flown so quickly!
Quote:
Originally Posted by lfredsbo
The teas sounds amazing......except or the rude grown ups
I too am surprised at the number of characters! That is awesome!
I truly had low expectations for the tea, thinking there would be a few princesses. It was really awesome!
Quote:
Originally Posted by WishIwasinDisney
Your report is amazing, I love every detail..every picture!
I live in Orlando and my parents live in The Villages. They absolutely LOVE The Villages, it's an amazing place to live. Let me know if I can be of any help to you, and if you need a tour guide, I bet my parents would love to show y'all around!
Thank you! I'll send you a PM when I know the dates of our visit there. Mom is really excited to see it there. What I mostly need to know is, what opportunities would I have for a job nearby to there, and where would Meri and I live (in an apartment, but where). We'll talk soon!
Quote:
Originally Posted by chezp
What a great couple of days! Sadly, and I don't know if it's my Internet, but I can't see any of your photos from either update.
Quote:
Originally Posted by chezp
Yay - now I can see the photos and they were worth the wait! The only problem now is I'm hungry, looking at all those food pics!
I'm glad it was your internet, and that it works now! *phew*
I'm linking up...so I can go back and read along. I'm catching up slowly and really enjoying reading during my lunch breaks. thanks for sharing and I'm excited to read all about it!
Such great updates!! The tea sounded like so much fun. I just love the little sandwiches and pastries! And with all those characters, it's better than the one at the Grand Floridian!! It's just too bad that inconsiderate grown-ups have to ruin it.
Very cool that Meri had the pool to herself for awhile! I'm the same as you though - I don't mess around when it comes to pool tiime. I watch those kids like a hawk in the water. You just never know!
Oh the food. Your two steaks look sooo good!! And all the brunch food, yum! When I think back to my cruise on the Magic, 12 years ago now, the delicious food is the first thing I remember!! That and how excited I was to see Donald Duck. I think we only saw him once during that cruise too - on formal night. I'm absolutely loving all the characters you guys are seeing!
__________________
Tanya
Every click helps feed .6 bowls of food to rescued animals. Give a quick click every day and help animals in shelters! www.theanimalrescuesite.com
I don't understand all the comments about Cinderella. Her wig may be in need of fixing, but that should be the job of the costume staff. She may not look like the typical Cinderella, but, to me, she is cute and doing the job she was hired to do. I've seen "older" looking princesses at WDW many times. Made no difference to me or my granddaughter.
All caught up, enjoying every update. Your photos of Meri with the characters are so cute. I also love your Mom's princess wave
LOL I'll be sure to tell mom that her wave looked good.
Quote:
Originally Posted by scdisneyfan
I'm linking up...so I can go back and read along. I'm catching up slowly and really enjoying reading during my lunch breaks. thanks for sharing and I'm excited to read all about it!
Yay! So glad you're here!
Quote:
Originally Posted by disney_duke
Such great updates!! The tea sounded like so much fun. I just love the little sandwiches and pastries! And with all those characters, it's better than the one at the Grand Floridian!! It's just too bad that inconsiderate grown-ups have to ruin it.
Very cool that Meri had the pool to herself for awhile! I'm the same as you though - I don't mess around when it comes to pool tiime. I watch those kids like a hawk in the water. You just never know!
Oh the food. Your two steaks look sooo good!! And all the brunch food, yum! When I think back to my cruise on the Magic, 12 years ago now, the delicious food is the first thing I remember!! That and how excited I was to see Donald Duck. I think we only saw him once during that cruise too - on formal night. I'm absolutely loving all the characters you guys are seeing!
I will say, the sandwiches at the GF are better than the ones at the princess tea... but that said, yes, the characters did make up for it, and then some!
Quote:
Originally Posted by nanajoyx2
I don't understand all the comments about Cinderella. Her wig may be in need of fixing, but that should be the job of the costume staff. She may not look like the typical Cinderella, but, to me, she is cute and doing the job she was hired to do. I've seen "older" looking princesses at WDW many times. Made no difference to me or my granddaughter.
I agree the costume staff should have noticed the disarray of the wig, as it's their job. She is definitely cute, and I had no issues with her performance, but she just always looked unkempt, probably because of the wig and occasionally the makeup was smudged. She looked a bit like she'd been out partying, and got in after midnight. Mostly it just provided entertainment for us and became a bit of a joke for the adults.
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LAND HO!!! Our wake-up call was set for 9am, but we were awake a bit before that. I guess we were just so excited! We went to Topsiders for breakfast, and sat outside on deck 9 to watch our arrival into Funchal, Madeira, because the dining room for Topsiders was packed! We had lovely seats right by the window, and we watched the Pilot boat come and guide us in.
It was pretty awesome to look at the beautiful scenery! After we ate, we headed up to deck 10 to enjoy the view – and we ran into both sets of our tablemates! The kids played fooz ball and ping pong while we adults just enjoyed the stunning vista in front of us!
We watched as we docked...
And then snapped more photos...
Look, a picture of ME!!!
I'm warning you, there are a LOT of scenery photos, so feel free to skim through them if they bore you after a while. I just thought everything was so picturesque!
Finally they announced the “all clear” and we headed down to the cabin for one last bathroom break before heading into Funchal! The line to disembark was really long but really it only took about 10 minutes and we were off the ship. Usually I’d wait for the first wave to get out of the way, but we had such a limited time in port for our own exploration that we wanted to hurry up and get going!
I don't know why but I felt moved to take a photo of this every time we got off of the boat, lol...
We took a taxi in to town for 7.50 Euros per person. Let me make this immeasurably clear to you all now. If you take a taxi in Funchal, please buckle up yourself AND your children! Don't be stupid like me and assume your kid will remember to buckle themselves up. The drivers don’t care, and honestly I was lax about it because we were so worried about other things at the time, I didn’t notice that Meri hadn’t buckled up. Well, at a traffic circle, we stopped short – and I do mean short – and Meri flew into the back of the driver’s seat. She was ok, but it startled her and hurt a little, and she was upset. Of course, I was upset, too - at myself, for being such an idiot! I immediately buckled her in, and kicked myself for not doing so beforehand (especially when I’m SO diligent about car safety at home) but of course, it was uneventful thereafter.
We were dropped at the start of the “main drag” if you will, and we started meandering along, intending to eventually make our way to a café. I didn’t want to stop at one of the first cafes we saw, because those are always the most pricey and touristy, and while I knew we wouldn’t find a homey Portuguese restaurant in the city center, I wanted to at least get down a ways first.
Mom loved this street musician
We took lots of photos, and window-shopped for a bit, and we found a fresh fruit vendor (they abound!) and thanks to a miscommunication, we picked up 5 euros worth of strawberries! That’s a LOT of strawberries!
We quickly went through a church in the city center. It didn't look like much from outside, but inside sure was ornate!
Then we meandered along down a side street until we ran into a small sidewalk café.
It was a small menu, but we liked what we saw.
Mom ordered the chicken salad, and Meri and I shared the tuna salad. Meri loves tuna, and I was thrilled to get her some protein after 10 days of pretty much nothing but pizza and cinnamon rolls!!! They had Fanta (my go-to drink in Europe) and I ordered that, but then the server asked me, “Orange or Pineapple?” Well. I had never had pineapple Fanta before, so I went out on a limb and gave that a whirl, and honestly, it was quite good!
Meri, however, wasn't impressed
We also ordered a “Dose of Potato Chips” – and let me go ahead and warn you, they’re fries, not potato chips, lol. I should have known that (chips in Europe are typically fries) but I wasn’t thinking clearly, apparently! Oops! Well, they were good anyway.
We settled up the bill (15,60 euros)
and left a couple of extra dollars for the tip, and started meandering back toward where we were dropped off, where there was a huge line of cabs waiting!
This time, we walked down the opposite side of the street, and stopped in a few little shops.
I picked up some postcards, and a little magnet for Cheryl and Mark – just to tide them over until they could get here and pick out their own! We stopped at Blandy’s winery (right in the city center) and grabbed some wine for family, our house-sitters and ourselves, and meandered a bit more until we got to the taxis! Then it was back to the port, and back to the room to drop off our purchases and meet for our excursion!
We put on our bathing suits under our clothes, even as we knew we wouldn’t be getting in the water… but I wanted to be SURE we were prepared, lol. Then Meri wanted to wear a dress, but I packed her wind breaker and pants, and I wore my new Disney sweatsuit (which will see a LOT of wear over the years, lol).
We met in Rockin Bar D, and they ticked our names off and gave us stickers with a 20 on it. There were two groups 19 and 20, and we were all going on the same excursion, but would be on different buses. We also grabbed three towels (again, just in case). We headed for the buses, and went back to the city center – this time to the marina! The funny thing here is that on our bus, the CM that was our "guide" was Alice! Her blonde hair was piled on top of her head in a bun every time we saw her out of character, so that she wouldn't be "figured out" by the kids (ironically she was a character handler when she wasn't Alice). Now, she never admitted to us that she was Alice, of course. Because only Alice is Alice, right? But yeah, it was her.
What the interior of the bus looks like
There were two catamarans, and the large group split up, with 19 and part of 20 on one, and the rest of 20 on a smaller one. At first it looked like we were going to be crammed on a catamaran, but then they let us out onto the nets, and it was fine.
Each side had three sets of nets, and Meri was ever-despondent because I wouldn’t let her be on the first set of nets (at the front of the catamaran). Meanest mom ever!
Meri took her dress off and was ready to roll. At this point, there was no sun, and it was roughly 66 degrees. Not really impressive, and we didn’t hold high hopes for the weather! Fortunately, before long, the sun peeked through and I actually took off my sweatshirt and t-shirt – but I left my sweats on!
No surprise that Meri made friends...
The sun felt good, and it was beautiful to just be skimming along the water, relaxing.
I listened to my iPod and took pictures, and kept an eye on Meri! Our spotter was on the top of the catamaran roof, and he was ever-watchful as we sailed along the coast.
Not an impressive sky...
After an hour and a half, we were certain that we would be out of luck with no dolphins or whales in sight. But then, lo, what was that? Whales! It was a pod of 5 or 6 of them, and they were all around us! They weren’t doing anything cool like breeching, but I was just glad that we could see them at all! It was very exciting! Mind you, the photos are stinkers because they were so fast, but you get the idea...
The other catamaran
She got to sit on the front net for a few minutes while we were stationary...
After a little while, we sailed away, and headed out a little further – and there was a bunch of dolphins! They were very difficult to photograph because they were so fast! They were racing the boat, so they were weaving in and out, going underneath us, and close to our pontoons, and just having a blast! I got two shots that prove that there were dolphins, lol, and then I gave up and put the camera down and just enjoyed racing with them! It was a great deal of fun to watch, and I felt like it really just completed the afternoon for us!
Look to the left of the pontoon to see one dolphin racing us
Another shot
At this point we had to turn and head back... and here's where you will be bombarded with landscape photos... I was on the island side for the return to the dock, so I had beautiful views, and while they probably all look the same after a while, I just couldn't stop snapping away. It was beautiful!
The seas were getting a bit choppy since we were cutting across some waves, and Meri hung out with two older girls so she could enjoy being splashed (and so she could be "cool" like them).
This one was on a funky angle for some reason, but I love the bridge, so I'm posting it.
I love that there's a house all the way at the bottom... how neat would that be?
I'd love to drive along some of these bridges! One day we want to come back for five days or so, and drive all over the island!
See that vertical line going down the side of the cliff? That's an elevator that takes you to a restaurant down below at the waters edge. It's the only way to get to the restaurant. All I can say is the food had better be outstanding...
Gardens!
Meri was mad at me because I wouldn't let her go jump on the nets with the boys...
Finally we started seeing buildings... we were really booking it there at the end, racing to get back because we were running a little behind!
A random wall...
Cool!
This one reminded me a bit of Tower of Terror...
We loved that the clouds looked like warm fluffy blankets over the mountains
On our way in, a ship was leaving and sounded its horn, and the Magic sounded its horn back, to say hello. Both catamarans cheered. It was really cute.
One of those windows was ours!
We laughed that we could see towel swans in these two windows...
The “all aboard” was 6:45pm, and let me tell you, we stepped onto that ship at 6:47pm! And there was still a really REALLY long line of people behind us! LOL! Good thing Disney holds the boat for its excursions!! Phew!
We went back to the cabin to change and drop our stuff off... and found this adorable little guy waiting for us...
Since we had missed dinner in the dining room, we headed up to Topsiders, which was amazingly empty! I guess I had expected more people up there! We went through the line and found a lovely table right outside on the deck with a fabulous view of the town. It was so nice to enjoy dinner and just have such a beautiful view right in front of us.
How about those clouds?
After dessert, I wandered over to the other side of the deck, to take a picture of the other end of the island, and lo and behold, there was a beautiful rainbow! It was very faint at first, and you really had to look to notice it.
See if you can spot the rainbow!
But it got brighter and bigger over the course of a few minutes, and everyone that saw it was enchanted by it! No matter where you walked along the deck, people were just stopped, looking at it and either taking pictures or just oohing and aahing over it!
It felt like our own special goodbye from Madeira as we pulled away! And then it faded away.
After dinner, I could feel a migraine coming on. I took my meds immediately and jumped into the shower, where I stayed under the hot water for about 20 minutes. When I got out, it was gone (phew) and I felt up to going to watch the Flamenco show in the Theatre. On our way in, though, we had to mess around a little with Chip and Dale! They’re just such cute little chipmunks!
The show was interesting, and I had to laugh because there were a few older gentlemen who departed (with their wives trailing behind) and looked very perturbed – we believe it was because of all of the hip action happening on the stage, lol. Flamenco dancing is Latin, and we all know that hip movement is a big part of things. These women were very beautiful and curvaceous and their outfits were quite fitted, of course. I didn’t find it at all inappropriate or un-family-friendly, but I believe some people were not happy with it, and left. *shrug* Can’t please em all! The only complaint I have is that the music was FAR too loud. When you look at a crowd and see 2/3 of them with their hands over their ears, it’s too loud. It was actually painfully loud. And you’re hearing this from someone who loves rock concerts and has sat in front of plenty of speakers with no issues! This music truly hurt my ears (not to mention my poor head)! I made Meri cover her ears, too, because I didn’t want any issues with her ears. Otherwise the show was fun to watch.
After that, we headed up to Deck 9 by the Goofy Pool to watch the Tropicala-Fragilistic-Expialidocious Deck Party. I was pretty surprised at how empty this party ended up being! It was cute to watch, and lots of fun (and lots quieter than the Flamenco show, lol).
By this time, the boat was really rocking and rolling, and the pool was a giant wave pool!
At one point, the pool splashed up so high that Goofy got darn near soaked! That was hilarious and I really wish I’d had my camera up for it! Who knew?! Just about all of the characters came and danced with all of the kids, and Meri just loved that! Every time I turned around, she was dancing with another character. Silly kid! The pictures were blurry because it was dark and of course they were in motion, but that's ok.
You can't really tell but Meri is beside Mickey - you can see her white sneakers and the bottom of her dress... lol
They did a conga line, which was cute
As I sat and watched more dancing, my assistant server, Kadek, came up and tapped me on the shoulder! He was serving hors d’oeuvres and offered me some. He asked about our day (since we missed dinner) and we chatted for a minute before he had to move on!
My snack
After we said goodbye to the characters, Meri and I headed back down to the cabin. The boat was really moving and it was annoying Meri when she was in bed. I worked on the trip report a little, because I’d fallen behind, and then finally went to bed somewhere a little after 1am I think. We had to set the clock forward for the last time, so it was really around midnight’ish but with the forward jump, it was after 1.
Madeira looks wonderful! I love the cobbled mosaic sidewalks! It's nice that you had some time to explore on your own and also do the whale-watch cruise. Those seas really looked choppy after a while-- I've never seen the water in the pools slop around like that, but then, any time the seas are rough you won't find me on deck!
I had to plot Madeira to see where it was, and it's closer to Morocco. Cool! I don't think you can ever have too many pictures. And they are all picturesque! Your wandering around the town sounded just lovely. Nice to be on land for a few moments. And what fun on the catamaran! I had a heck of a time trying to get photos of dolphins off the coast of Mexico too. But you got 2!
The character party looked like fun too. Donald!! Isn't it funny that crossing the entire Atlantic didn't give you nearly as bad of waves as you just got that night?! And apparantly more to come too?!
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Tanya
Every click helps feed .6 bowls of food to rescued animals. Give a quick click every day and help animals in shelters! www.theanimalrescuesite.com
Love the dancing pics, and especially the one with the pool almost splashing out (although, I imagine it wasn't so comfortable for those of you on the boat).
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The only problem now is I'm hungry, looking at all those 
food pics!
Sadly, and I don't know if it's my Internet, but I can't see any of your photos from either update. 
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