A special birthday, a diamond anniversary and a west coast adventure COMPLETED IN THIS FORUM 12/2 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Saturday 5 September – part six: how are we going to eat again in two hours’ time?
Once we were all aboard the bus, we headed off for George Inlet Lodge, seeing a waterfall on the way…
Finally, we were there, and descending down the 79 steps, only this time, unlike last time where we knew we’d be taking a seaplane back, we’d have to walk up them to get back to the bus.
We got some photos before heading inside…
… and we were seated with Tony and Tamara from West Virginia, who were perfectly pleasant, although I did have to tread carefully when they asked us what we thought of Hilary Clinton, not knowing their political persuasion. I just gave my usual stock non-political answer that it was about time the USA had a female President, as after all, they were now nearly 40 years behind us, as we had our first female Prime Minister in 1979.
We started off with a salad…
We got given our instructions on how to deal with the crab:
I have to say I struggled with my crab. Getting my lunch was certainly hard work, and although our two servers did take us through how to do it, I found it quite complicated, and struggled to follow it, so I just did my own thing. Whether it was right, I don’t know, but I got there in the end. There probably was an easier way, but never mind.
This time at the George Inlet Lodge was very different. Last time, on our flightseeing trip, there had been about eight or nine of us, and we had one person taking us through how to deal with the crab, and she’d been able to come round to see us individually to see how we were doing, and help out if needed. There was nothing like that today, as there were just too many of us. That was a real shame. In truth, I didn’t think our two servers were that great. Both Tamara and I asked for an extra napkin, and we never received one, and we also received our hot towels long before either of us had finished, so by the time we got to use them, they were pretty cold. Still, having said that, the crab was pretty darned good, although by the time we’d finished eating, it was 4:00pm. How the heck was I ever going to eat anything in less than two hours? I had no idea…
We waddled out of there, stuffed with crab, and I was actually glad of the 79 steps, as at least it gave us a chance to work off some of the extra fat we’d just put into our bodies.
The coach journey back was a bit painful, with Jonathan telling us another of his long winded stories. I’d love to recount it to you, as it was all about how the raven stole the sun, moon and stars, and gave them to the whole of the earth, but frankly, it was so long, I lost track of it quite early on, tuned out for a bit, and after that, I’d given up any hope of understanding where we were with it. As I say, others seemed to appreciate his stories, but they did nothing for me.
I didn’t take any photos on the way back, as the rain had continued to get heavier and heavier, and it was now impossible to shoot anything through the windows.
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