Our "30 Year Anniversary" Disney Vacation 2014 [February 7-14] - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Great final day. I love that caprese flatbread - had it for dinner in November.
It was delish! I have been pleased with everything I've ever ordered at PVH, but I think this flatbread was my favorite!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cam22
What a wonderful last day, especially the slow dance at dinner!
Peter doesn't like doing stuff like that in public (or at least be in the spotlight), so it was even more special!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Colexis Mom
Great last day at MK! Sorry your seats weren't the best at HDDR but it sounds like you still has a great time!
We have only done Cat. 3 seating for the show, as we love the balcony view. I guess I should have been happy we got upgraded, but we just don't like those seats as well. And our waiter, bless his heart, was as unenthusiastic as they come. He finally "warmed up" to us near the end of our dinner. Otherwise, we had a good time!
Quote:
Originally Posted by DMA
Great last day! One of these days I want to do Hoop dee doo. It looks like a real hoot!
Not only is the dinner delish....it's a fun night!
I think this was my 4th time!
Quote:
Originally Posted by B.M.
Hoop Dee Doo is one of my favorite dinners- sounds like a great way to end the trip!
I was trying to think of something that we love to end the trip....we didn't have any dining credits left, but splurged for a special ending!
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What a great vacation-one of the best! Two very sad people started driving around 9 a.m., and drove all day, stopping only for gas and lunch. We were not in a big hurry to head back to the cold weather we had left behind at home. Somewhere around South Carolina, we started to see the effects of the ice storm we had heard about. There were tree limbs down near the highway, but nothing to hinder our driving.
It was Valentine's Day, and we were hoping to find a nice hotel and restaurant to celebrate. We started talking about where we might stop for the night. We considered Florence, since that was where we stopped the first night on our way down. I was looking at the map and Myrtle Beach didn't look that far off the beaten path and since we had never been there before we thought, why not?......
Long story short and a huge traffic jam later, it definitely was off the beaten path! We decided to at least have dinner there and when we drove past a Captain George's Restaurant, we both agreed-that was the place to stop! It was sooooo good!
Happy Valentine's Day!!!
They handed out roses as you entered the restaurant, so I got flowers for Valentine's Day too!
After dinner, Peter said he would like to keep driving a little further, which we did and ended up in Wilmington, N.C. at a Holiday Inn Express. Maybe we'll get a chance to actually enjoy Myrtle Beach on a future road trip!
Saturday February 15, 2014
We woke up to a dreary, cold day and the wind was blowing very hard. Very uneventful, just driving, driving, and more driving. We still had a few more hours of travel before reaching home, so we decided to spend the night with Lindsey in MD (Logan was awy at work). We made a quick stop in Lowe's to get a few things for the carpenter who had almost completed the job at home.
By the time we got to Lowes parking lot, it was snowing! UGH! Back to reality indeed!
We had a Texas Roadhouse gift card that we couldn't let go to waste, so we enjoyed one more dinner together before ending our trip.
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.
Except for returning to the cold, gloomy weather, your travels back sound good.
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Originally Posted by lfredsbo
Sounds like a great ending to your trip! Well except the return to yucky cold
Thanks for sharing with us!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Colexis Mom
Great trip you guys had!
Quote:
Originally Posted by B.M.
Glad you had a safe ride home! Sounds like a nice Valentine's day!
Thanks everyone for reading! Wish I had come back the boards earlier to do this TR, but at least I did one. I usually do a much more in depth PTR & TR, but life seemed to sidetrack me and here it is, almost a year later and we are about to go back.
This trip was one of the best for us....coming up...final thoughts!!
While Peter and I love family trips, we seem to enjoy our "just the two of us" trips a lot!!! We sometimes talk about traveling with another couple even, but soon dismiss the idea, as we are perfect traveling partners!
I mentioned before that Peter doesn't do any of the planning. I, on the other hand, absolutely love it!! We pretty much love the same things (except for roller coasters and other wild rides), but we've even worked past that. We love food....and while neither of us are very adventurous, we do like trying new places (and repeatng some of our faves).
Peter hates flying, so we drive. I really don't mind this either, if it's just the two of us. Traveling with kids, even teens, is harder.
We will only stay on property. That is a must for us when going to Disney. I doubt we'll ever stray from this. We both love using Disney transportation, and prefer it to getting into our SUV and finding (and paying for) parking at the parks.
While we loved staying at moderate resorts (Coronado Springs once and Caribbean Beach -3x) and a deluxe (Beach Club), we absolutely loved our stay at the values (ASMusic one night and the rest of our stay at ASMovies) and can't wait to go back!
I can't think of any negatives of staying at a value, in fact, it had a few things we liked better. The buses was the biggest plus. We loved the bus stop set up. I liked that you had one stop to wait at, instead of bus stops at each section. When staying at CBR, it took quite a bit of time to make the rounds to each section's bus stop. At the All Stars resorts, you get picked and dropped off at one stop. And then there was our stay at Beach Club. Of course, walking over to Epcot was awesome and being able to use the monorail or boat was great, but the bus system (in my opinion) was horrible. So, the buses, for us, worked really well (despite the number of cheerleaders staying the same time we were). There were LOTS of cheerleaders staying while we were there, but that really wasn't a problem, I guess since we left for the parks a little later in the morning.
I didn't take as many notes this trip, but I'll recap day to day with +/- of each day.
Day 1- Magic Kingdom day #1.....of course, the Dapper Dan's (& Peter) singing to me was a highlight of the trip and a great way to start it off! I highly recommend again getting pins for your special occasion...we were truly made to feel very special all throughout the trip.
We tried Be Our Guest for the first time and was very impressed with the food and atmosphere- we will go back in the future.
We had some rain on our first day, but we pulled out the ponchos and carried on!
On our Animal Kingdom day the next day- we were disappointed the FotLK was not showing. It's our favorite show!
We finally rode Kali River Rapids....Peter wasn't a fan, I loved it! He was happy when I told him it looks like it will be down for refurb? when we return in February.
Epcot day - we loved the Test Track re-do. It's one of our favorites and we love the upgrades to this ride.
Dinner at OHana was once again-AWESOME! And watching Wishes from the Poly beach- MAGICAL!!! I highly recommend fitting this in!
Our DHS day- we spent half of the day in DTD. We tried Planet Hollywood for the first, and while it was "ok" we aren't too anxious to go back anytime soon. We almost rode Characters in Flight, but it was a no-go due to wind. It's at the top of our list for next trip!!
We toured PO French Quarter and LOVED it! Gorgeous resort. We love resort hopping and try to tour at least one each trip.
Peter loves American Idol and was sad to hear that it is now closed. I am anxious to see what he finds to do in it's place.
We found a new spot to watch Illuminations after leaving Beach Club (boat launch between Beach Club and Epcot). We are planning to check it out again! The only problem we found with taking the boat over to BC from DHS was....the park was closed by the time we finished dinner/fireworks, so we were put off at Swan...then bus to DTD....then bus to ASMovies!!! A LONG ride back to our resort!!! Live & learn!
On our evening in DTD, we ended up at Disney Quest after our dinner at Rainforest Cafe'. It was pouring and we had a little time t kill before our movie time. We normally wouldn't have tried DQ, but it was a dry place to wait and have fun (and it was FREE). I highly recommend checking out all the discounts in your travel package from WDW. Admission to DQ was $47.93 each! I would never pay that much, as we aren't big game fans, but for a family with kids or for adult gamers...it's a great deal!!!
We were glad we added another day to our stay! That is one of the perks of driving down....a more flexible schedule. We had one park day left on our tickets and a few dining credits that we just couldn't let go to waste.
And Hoop Dee Doo....if you haven't been...go...it's a favorite for us....great food & good fun!
The overall weather was nice, the best we've had. Even the rain didn't hinder us from enjoying Disney!
Traveling in February- we left some very cold and nasty weather in Virginia, and while most days aren't balmy, I enjoy the late spring/early summer type weather while we are there. Days can get hot and nights can cool down, but the overall 70 degree weather is pefect for us!
Dining Plan- I can't imagine not doing the DP. For us, it works perfectly, and really does save us $$.
Thanks again for reading my "30 Year Anniversary" trip report....
now hop on over to my new one...PTR: A Whole New World - February 6-13, 2015 (link in my signature). We leave in just 11 days!!!!!!!!!
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.
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Otherwise, we had a good time! 
Susan
for sharing you adventures as just the two of you in WDW. Can't wait to hear all about the new trip. 
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