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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Who: Me (Tara O) - lover of all things Disney and cruising!! Also a person who really, really, really wanted to go on the Disney Fantasy instead of this cruise but simply cannot justify this big of a price difference. {{{{{{SIGH}}}}}}
Muffin- A very happy person right now because we are saving three thousand dollars by switching up our cruise.
What: A week on the Oasis of the Seas
When: March 4th-11th
Why: We love to travel!!
So what happened to my resolve to go on a Disney cruise???????
Well, it all started on Sunday when we had our family Christmas party.....
Sean and Jane mistakenly assumed that the cruise we were going on in April was a Royal Caribbean one and I can certainly understand that because normally they would be right. I thanked them for the generous gift and figured I would use it eventually and stuck it in my dresser drawer.
I will say here that Muffin did ask me, just once, if I just wanted to take a look at the cruises from RCCL just to check them out but when I said no way, he backed right off and did not bring it up again.
I honestly didn’t give it another thought until today when I received a random email from Royal Caribbean and thought ‘ok, I will just take a look’. Well, the first cruise I looked at was pretty comparable to the Fantasy cruise on April 7th and my jaw honestly dropped when I saw that it was ALOT cheaper!! In fact, I could get a suite on the Oasis of the Seas for less than I had paid for a guaranteed 5E stateroom on the Fantasy!!
This made me look at some other possibilities and each and every one including a cruise out of Barcelona on a very nice RCCL ship was less than half the price. I mulled this over briefly, still wanting desperately to make the Disney Cruise work and decided that, as much as we love Royal Caribbean, I honestly could not justify the price difference.
Knowing that we could still get a full refund, I bit back my pride and cancelled the Fantasy cruise. Then I went downstairs to talk to Muffin. I simply said that I would like to switch our cruise to RCCL. He even asked me if I was sure before we began looking at possibilities. I told him it was a done deal and all we had to do now was find a replacement cruise.
We did look at the Barcelona cruise, which we both would have loved to have done again but the dates didn’t work. We looked at the cruise for the Eastern Caribbean the same week and were about to book it when Muffin came up with a different idea.
He asked me if I would mind going in March instead of April. He said he had to go back to Hong Kong at the end of April and could still do the week of the 7th, but it would give him more breathing room if we went in March.
I saw no reason to turn that offer down, so we began looking in March. Since we would to change our flights anyway, we really didn’t care if we went out of Port Canaveral or Ft. Lauderdale so we looked at both ports.
We also decided to switch over to the Western Caribbean instead of the Eastern because although we love both, we hadn’t done the Western in a while. We did see that the Oasis of the Seas is now leaving from Port Canaveral and had a Western route on both the 4th and the 18th of March.
We decided to go for the 4th because we felt like the 18th was cutting it a little too close to Spring break. We know it won’t be as warm as going in April but we usually go in January anyway, so that really doesn’t bother us! :
I plugged in the dates and there were still some decent rooms available but what really intrigued me was the guarantee balconies. They were around 400 bucks cheaper than the ones we could pick ourselves and for the amount of time we spend out there, we decided the difference could be a couple of nice dinners and a fun excursion. So that’s what we booked. Mind you, there is chance we could wind up with an obstructed view but again, the Oasis is so beautiful and has so many gorgeous spots to watch docking and sailing away from that we simply don’t care if we have to look at a life boat or not from our balcony!
I need to back up for just a minute because even though I said the Oasis was beautiful, I will tell you we have not been on it yet! We have, however, been on both of her sister ships; the Allure and the Harmony and this is truly our favorite class of ship!
We love the way the ships are broken up into neighborhoods. There are 7 distinct areas of the ship to explore and the layout is phenomenal! They are:
The Royal Promenade
Central Park
The Boardwalk
Pools and Sports Zone
Vitality of the Seas Spa
Entertainment Place
Youth Zone
The Youth Zone is the only one we don’t frequent! The others are awesome!
Also, for those of you who have read my previous cruise reports, you know we adore the restaurants on board! Muffin said since I saved so much money by doing this, I could book anything I wanted to and he would not complain!
The ports we are visiting are Labadee, Falmouth and Cozumel. We are going to look at excursions tonight and also dining options. All in all, I am super happy with our decision to do this cruise! I am slightly sad about the Fantasy, but money is money and we already know we love Royal Caribbean!!
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I told him it was a done deal and all we had to do now was find a replacement cruise.
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