Our 1st Proper Halloween - Pacific Coast Cruise Leg - Completed 4/24/2013 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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!
Welcome! We're happy you've found the PassPorter Community -- the friendliest place to plan your vacation to Walt Disney World, Disney Cruise Line, Disneyland, and the world in general! You are now viewing the PassPorter Message Board Community as a guest, which gives you limited access. As our guest, feel free to browse our messages by selecting the forum you want to visit from the list below.
To post messages and ask questions, join our FREE community today and you'll get access to tools and resources not available to guests, such as our vacation countown timers, "living" avatars, private messaging system, database searches, downloads, and a special PassPorter discount code. Registration is fast, simple, and completely free. Just click the Join Our Community link.
If you think you've already joined, log in below now. If you don't remember your member name or password, please visit our Member Name and Password Recovery page. You are also welcome to contact us.
As today was the last full day of the cruise, there was so much we wanted to get done in an effort to make the most of things while we still could. Our ideal itinerary for the day, was as follows:
11.45am-3.45pm: Taste of Mexico tour
3.45pm-4.45pm: Final jackpot bingo
6.15pm-7.15pm: Pre-dinner show: Dreams : an enchanted classic
8.15pm-9.15pm: Our last dinner at Triton's
10pm-10.30pm: Till we meet again (a farewell show held in the atrium)
10.30pm: Have luggage out in the corridor by this time
Unfortunately, we found all this so overwhelming , that we made a joint decision to just let it all go and do nothing except attend the last bingo session I know that sounded like a rash (and perhaps, boring) decision to some people, but we didn't see how we could get all of the above done, while still having time to pack and get our luggage out in the corridor by the collection time of 10.30pm. We had amassed so many new possessions during the cruise (some of them oddly shaped and varying degrees of delicateness), and knew it would take us forever to pack if previous packing sessions were anything to go by. Though I do admit that if we had gotten up early and packed then, then perhaps we could've achieved our ideal itinerary. Surely the excitement of the activities would've helped keep us awake if we had've been tired. But it's too late to change things now.
So instead of a crazy busy day, we had one of our notoriously lazy days, usually reserved for the at sea days. I still hadn't written any postcards even at this late stage of the trip, so I spent a few hours sitting out on the balcony, writing as many as I could, to the background noise of honking seals.
This seal looks as if he's smiling for the camera!
The Mexican port wasn't as exciting to look at as San Francisco had been, so it wasn't a distraction to my task at hand at all. Nest and I discussed what we should do with all the Mexican pesos we had, and we jokingly talked about throwing them over the side for other people to use, but in the end, decided that we'd keep them for a future cruise that included a Mexican port of call. Besides, we probably would've gotten into trouble for throwing things overboard, even if it was just money.
For lunch, we went up to Beach Blanket Buffet to see what was on offer, and saw they had put on a Mexican themed spread (which turned out to be massively delicious! ), complete with a Mexican soundtrack - very apt!
Nest had:
· Beef tacos (two big serves)
· Fried beef burritos (he noted these as being particularly yummy!)
· A rice side dish amongst others (Nest's notes were brief, and I couldn't find photos to help)
· Two serves of dessert consisting of crepes and ice cream with chocolate topping, canned peaches, and mini marshmallows
I had:
· Shrimp and popcorn ceviche
· Fresh prawns
· Corn chip salad
· Tortilla soup (I only had a little bit in case I didn't like it, but it was really yummy)
· Cajun spiced grouper with a mango papaya relish (absolutely delicious!)
· Spring rolls
· A variety of wraps
· Cubed cheeses
· Corn salsa
· Pulled pork (I honestly thought this was beef. I shouldn't eat pork, as it doesn't agree with me, but this was sooooo yummy!)
· A mini lemon meringue pie, peach jelly with mini marshmallows, a white chocolate cheesecake square with dark chocolate biscuit base, and choc peppermint mousse
I know it sounded as if I had more than my fair share of food, but I swear it was just a whole lot of little portions of many dishes No, I didn't plan on weighing myself once off the ship, to make sure I didn't put on more than the promised seven pound maximum After lunch, we took photos of the Mexican scenery from the top deck...
...and then went to the sports area where we played some table tennis and foosball.
At 3.45pm, we rocked up to WaveBands to take part in the $5000 jackpot bingo. So many people took part, that the jackpot went up to over $5200! Cards and electronic machine at the ready, we then got our beverages sorted - water for Nest, and a Godiva chocolate martini for me (Absolut vanilla, Godiva chocolate liqueur, white creme de cacao, and frangelico.) (Nest chose the water himself, by the way - I didn't insist he have it while I indulged in an extravagant cocktail.)
I was thrilled beyond belief when I got a bingo in the second game! I shot up so fast, shouting, "BINGO!",at the top of my voice, hoping upon hope that I drowned out anyone else and could therefore keep the entire $531 for myself Unfortunately, two other people had valid claims, so the total was split three ways and I walked away with $177. Still an awesome feeling Two people shared the $5200 jackpot - they must've been on top of the world!
Like with Nest's win, to celebrate my win, we went up to Pluto's Dog House for weenie dogs with mustard, tomato sauce, and fries. The deck seemed strangely vacant ... maybe everyone was in their staterooms, packing ... like perhaps we should've been During our bingo session, the ship had departed port, so we ate our weenie dogs to the sight of the Mexican coast disappearing off into the horizon, briefly wondering what our day would've been like if we had gone on our port adventure.
After our celebratory snack, Nest got a chocolate soft serve from the soft serve machine we found hidden around a corner, and was then immediately drawn to the Quarter Masters Arcade - I was surprised we hadn't spent more time there, to tell the truth from past experiences
Nest had a go at pretty much everything inside, as it wasn't as big inside as we had first thought. Even if it was big inside, I'm pretty sure Nest still would've had a go at everything
I wasn't ready!
He excelled at the Stacker machine in particular, winning me not one, but two super squeezy stress balls to replace the one he won me at the Pop Century Resort games arcade in WDW, but broke by accidentally sitting on it!
He made playing the Stacker look so easy, even I thought I could excel at it ... WRONG! I was squawking in frustration seconds after having begun my turn, with Nest having to take over. He even managed to beat me at the only arcade game I am any good at - air hockey.
Still managing to avoid the awful task of packing, we then went around the ship, taking photos of the areas we had spent the most time in, such as the Route 66 corridor leading to WaveBands, the shopping corridor, and the huge portrait of Walt on the wall outside the Walt Disney Theatre, as well as beautiful sights such as the magnificent chandelier in the atrium, our favourite pieces of artwork lining the corridors, and some examples of decorated stateroom doors (someone had written, ''Don't make us leave! We want to stay!'', on the noticeboard they had stuck up outside their door.)
Eventually, we reluctantly returned to our stateroom to begin tackling the task we had been avoiding all day - packing There was a towel lobster and goodnight choccies waiting for us Packing was very tough going, and I took a break part-way through to go to Shutters to buy our formal night and pirate night photos before things got too crowded there.
After much struggle with the task at hand, we managed to get our main suitcases with red Mickey tags attached, out into the corridor for collection, half an hour before the deadline of 10.30pm. If we had missed the deadline, we would've had a massive struggle on our hands, trying to get them off the ship along with all our day bags.
We didn't allow ourselves to have dinner until we had finished packing. Two minutes after leaving our luggage out in the corridor, I placed our order of the following with room service:
Nest had:
· Crispy chicken tenders and chips
· Vegetarian delight pizza
· Fresh fruit bowl
· A Big Island extra large choc chip cookie
· Low fat milk
I had:
· A steak sandwich with chips
· Fresh fruit bowl
· A Big Island extra large choc chip cookie
To share, I got us another six pack of Evian waters, as we go through water like nobody's business. We called it a night after dinner, wishing the cruise wasn't coming to an end
About This Page: 
, that we made a joint decision to just let it all go and do nothing except attend the last bingo session 
I know that sounded like a rash (and perhaps, boring) decision to some people, but we didn't see how we could get all of the above done, while still having time to pack and get our luggage out in the corridor by the collection time of 10.30pm. We had amassed so many new possessions during the cruise (some of them oddly shaped and varying degrees of delicateness), and knew it would take us forever to pack if previous packing sessions were anything to go by. Though I do admit that if we had gotten up early and packed then, then perhaps we could've achieved our ideal itinerary. Surely the excitement of the activities would've helped keep us awake if we had've been tired. But it's too late to change things now.
), complete with a Mexican soundtrack - very apt!
No, I didn't plan on weighing myself once off the ship, to make sure I didn't put on more than the promised seven pound maximum 
I shot up so fast, shouting, "BINGO!",at the top of my voice, hoping upon hope that I drowned out anyone else and could therefore keep the entire $531 for myself 
Two people shared the $5200 jackpot - they must've been on top of the world!
There was a towel lobster and goodnight choccies waiting for us 
Like
Thank
Pixie Dust
Threaded Mode
