Springing back to Iceland to see it in the green! COMPLETED 6/29 - Page 7 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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What a shame about the whale & puffin tours...as a bird watcher I would have been more than bummed. I think despite the weather, you made great use of your blustery day.
It was a shame, but there's nothing we can do about it, except try and make the best of it, which I think we managed to do.
The rain and strong winds have continued throughout today, although it sounds like they will at least ease a little for our flight tomorrow morning...
We thought it wouldn't affect our time at the Blue Lagoon much, but let's just say there was nowhere that was particularly sheltered in the water, apart from hiding right behind the bar. We spent a bit of time there enjoying our free drink with our package, but there was no way we could hang out there all the time. We didn't last in the water anywhere near as long as we'd have liked, but we were getting blown around something stupid. We spent some time relaxing on the loungers indoors and watching the going-ons outside, before our lunch at Lava, which was very good.
We took a quick drive around Grundavik, where we're staying, earlier on, and we've been at the hotel for the past couple of hours just chilling, listening to the by now familiar sound of the wind howling around outside...
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Sorry to hear about the continued weather woes in Iceland! Not exactly the ideal conditions you were hoping for in the Blue Lagoon!
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October 6, 2017-Enjoying an amazing dinner at Victoria & Albert's with PP's Dot and Drew
My TR from my most recent trip is now underway. Includes: Universal Studios Florida, Disney World and Sea World Orlando Trifecta TR -Updated December 10th! TR is now COMPLETED!
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Well, we're back home again, so it's time to get this show on the road, so with no further ado....
Thursday 27 April – part one: oh my, what a stressful day!
I cannot begin to tell you how stressful my last day at work was before heading out. I’ll just say I work in communications, both internal and external, and I swear every journalist decided to come to me with the hardest enquiries they could come up with. It was as if they knew it was my last day in.
It didn’t help that I’d been in Brighton yesterday, and instead of an hour and a quarter journey home, due to motorway closures, it had taken me two and a half hours. Ugh! When I got home, my ankle was in a huge amount of pain. I also had to go into town at lunchtime to get a few more Icelandic krone, and it’s walking that really hurts my ankle, so by the time I got back from that, I was exhausted and in pain – not a good combination.
I ended up asking my manager if I could leave early, and finish off working at home, as then I wouldn’t have to worry about getting stuck in traffic during the rush hour on the way home. Well, the plan sort of worked. There was more traffic than I’d have liked, and I was later back than I’d have liked, plus my work computer and I had a bit of an argument over an Ethernet cable and it’s fair to say I was fairly snappy with Mark as I tried to finish off the last bits and pieces. I was so glad when it was all done and I could forget about it for the next few days…
We weren’t exactly quick to get going, shall we put it that way? It didn’t help that we’d left the suitcases upstairs, and although I’d packed most of my stuff up there, it was a bit weird to have everything up there, now I’ve got used to packing downstairs. Finally, we got there, and the suitcases both came in way below the weight limit, so we were set. If anything, I was having more issues with my hand luggage, as I want to ensure that I’ve got everything I need when I get to Iceland, in terms of gloves, snood, hat… you get the idea!
We settled down to dinner, just some simple microwave meals, and of course, I think you can guess what happened next… I managed to spill some of it on my light pink DVC member T-shirt. It was orange, and let’s just say with where it was, it looked as if Tinkerbell had had an accident… A bit of water and soap later, and the problem was sorted out.
We eventually got on the road much later than we’d planned, around 8:00pm, rather than the 7:00pm I’d thought. However, at least the bonus was that the M25 was nice and quiet, which doesn’t often happen. I didn’t get any photos on the way up, as it was past sunset, and it was raining most of the way.
We made it to the Hyatt Place, and I thought we hadn’t stayed here before. Well, when we arrived, it became clear we had, perhaps when it was a different name? I was horrified to see the line of people waiting to check in when we arrived, and I stood there for over 10 minutes, in agony, as I was standing awkwardly, trying not to put too much weight on my bad ankle, and of course standing really hurts me with my chronic fatigue.
When I finally got to the front desk, I almost collapsed, and was in agony. The woman took pity on me, and asked if I’d like a room near the elevators. please! We unloaded the luggage from the car, grabbed a luggage cart, and headed up to the fifth floor. Oh my goodness, Mark trying to get that luggage cart through the doorway and round the corner towards our room was just classic. He made about three attempts. It probably wasn’t really funny, but you know that point that when you just need to laugh? That was me just then…
When we got into the room, it was clear we’d never stayed in a room like this before. It was certainly an unusual layout.
Mark eventually returned from taking the luggage cart back to the lobby about five minutes after he set off, after the elevator journey from hell with two smokers who’d just come in from having a cigarette outside. Not nice at all…
We set our phones for an early wake-up call of 5:00am in the morning, and that was us done for the night.
The weather today was some rain and temperatures in the high 40s as we drove to the airport. The best thing today was not having to rush up to the airport for meet and greet parking. The worst thing today was the wait to check in at the hotel. The funniest thing today was Mark with the luggage cart. Today we tried staying at the Hyatt Place And the result was only to discover we’d actually stayed there before…
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Glad you made it home safe. That wind in Iceland can be very strong. I remember one time watching a large dumpster like businesses would have blowing down the hill while we lived there.
Glad you made it home safe. That wind in Iceland can be very strong. I remember one time watching a large dumpster like businesses would have blowing down the hill while we lived there.
After what we've experienced the last few days, I can now really believe that.
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Not exactly the ideal conditions you were hoping for in the Blue Lagoon! 
When I got home, my ankle was in a huge amount of pain. I also had to go into town at lunchtime to get a few more Icelandic krone, and it’s walking that really hurts my ankle, so by the time I got back from that, I was exhausted and in pain – not a good combination. 
It didn’t help that we’d left the suitcases upstairs, and although I’d packed most of my stuff up there, it was a bit weird to have everything up there, now I’ve got used to packing downstairs. Finally, we got there, and the suitcases both came in way below the weight limit, so we were set. If anything, I was having more issues with my hand luggage, as I want to ensure that I’ve got everything I need when I get to Iceland, in terms of gloves, snood, hat… you get the idea! 
A bit of water and soap later, and the problem was sorted out. 
He made about three attempts. It probably wasn’t really funny, but you know that point that when you just need to laugh? That was me just then… 
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