A Grown Woman Crying--Our First Trip (Finally Posted!) - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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A Grown Woman Crying--Our First Trip (Finally Posted!)
I've not posted a trip report yet as I've been busy planning my next TWO return trips! But I've been given such fantastic advice on this site, I feel I should share the story of 'the first trip'. So....ahem...this is going to be long...
Part I--Arrival
I never wanted to go to Disney World. In fact, when I was ten years old, my family took me there and I hated it. But I 'had to' go back this past November to attend a convention. My husband and I were coming off of an absolutely awful trip to Europe (Who doesn't like Paris? This girl!) and he was honestly scared to travel with me again so close to 'The Europe Misadventure'. Well, guess what? I LOVED Disney World. I sat in the airport on the way home and googled prices for a return trip. Seven days after we landed at our home airport, I'd completely booked and planned a mother-daughter trip, and I've been given lots of great advice on here for that planning. But I digress...let's start at the beginning...
We spent our first night off-site to save money. The Hampton Inn was great, as was the very nice Italian restaurant we walked to at 9:30pm, starving and in need of a post-work-day-post-two-hour-flight glass of wine. I wish I knew the name of the restaurant because I'd recommend it to everyone.
The alarm clock went off at 6am and my husband started jumping up and down (I am not kidding) and yelling 'we're going to Disney World!' I had told him I would be doing this, but I was wrong--I was really, really tired! It took us 10 minutes to get from the cheap hotel to the lobby of the Beach Club Resort, another five to check into our hotel (at 7:30am!), another five to walk to our room, and maybe another ten to freshen up and walk to the bus stop. We were at the gates to the Magic Kingdom before 8:40.
I had no idea there was a little show before the rope drop (in fact, I'd never heard the term 'rope drop' before!) and right before the train pulled into the station and all of the characters started singing and dancing, this HUGE bird flew up and landed on the ball on top of the american flag pole on the highest point of the train station. It was really amazing...and then I started to cry. Just a little, mind you, but a few tears leaked out. Yes, there I stood, a grown woman crying at a bird and the opening ceremony to the Magic Kingdom.
I cried harder when we actually entered the park.
I clicked a few quick photos and then practically ran down Main Street towards the castle...
I shall stop now and attempt to upload some photos. Stay tuned for Part II--The Magic Kingdom!
Photos below: 1. The husband waiting to get in to the MK. 2. A fuzzy pic of the bird on the rooftop. 3. Me SO excited!
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