Cindybelle's Bella Notte TR COMPLETE!! - UPDATED 10/19 With Prices! - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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INCREDIBLE shots, cin....just love them...wow, i really wish i could have gone with you...i definitely think you need to organize a pp tour of churcha-churcha and fooda-fooda in italy!
Sheri, this is a good introduction to some tips I'm ready to give anyone who wants to travel to Rome. There's not much I would do differently other than possibly forego the Borghese Gallery, and if we'd hit that in the morning instead of in the afternoon, I would probably not even say to skip that if you have three days.
First, who wants to hear about money? I spent about $3,500 for EVERYTHING -- that's my air fare (almost $1,000), my share of meals, entrance fees, train tickets, souvenirs, gifts -- everything. Considering we were in Italy for 10 days, with 2 travel days, I don't think that's bad at all. Yes, I had to save up for it, but boy was it worth it!
Speaking of money -- using ATMs to get Euros was quick and easy. All our hotels offered cash discounts. Rick and I ended up using cash for everything over there -- which is nice, because neither of us will be receiving a large credit card bill anytime soon. The ATM fees aren't bad at all.
Second, I believe that anyone who's good at planning a group WDW vacation will be naturally good at planning a trip to Italy. A lot of the same issues apply: you'll be tempted to do too much (because you're paying all that money), but you need to build in some "down" time. And if things don't go your way, look around and find something else to do. It works in WDW, and it works in Rome!
After reading my Rome part of this TR, you may be thinking, "Cindy overbooked this -- they did too much every day." Well, guess again!
The four of us had had many conversations about what we "must do" and what we'd "like to do, time and energy permitting." If anyone wanted a rest, we all seemed to feel that way and we rested.
Here's what was on our itinerary for Rome:
Wed, Sept. 2 - arrive Rome 08:30; take taxi to Hotel Nerva. (I didn't know how tired we'd be, so I purposely left the rest of the day blank.)
Fri, Sept. 4 - "Ancient City" - see what we can of the Colosseum, Forum, Pantheon, Palatine Hill (time and energy permitting).
15:00 (3:00pm) - reservation for Borghese Gallery. Pay upon arrival.
That's it! Now, under our "would like to see" you find these things:
St. Peter-in-Chains Basilica (Paul)
Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain (all)
So, what DIDN'T we do? We never did Palatine Hill, and we didn't do an organized tour of the Colosseum or the Forum -- but we felt great about what we saw on our own.
Now you understand why all four of us left Rome absolutely delighted with all we'd experienced in three days. You've just got to know your priorities and then roll with the punches.
That said, Sheri, I would be happy to planna-planna a PP trippa-trippa to Italy!
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