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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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.
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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.
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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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I am trying to figure out when the best time is to book our ADRS at a few places taking into consideration shows, afternoon breaks, and fastpass. Opinions...
Tusker House: want to do the Nemo show at either 12 or 3. Would a 1:15 ADR be okay. Thinking FP at 930, 1030 and 1130?
CRT: will be there for EMH and then leave to take a nap. Thinking 1ish for ADR and FP at the same 930,1030 and 1130
BOG: will hopefully be doing supper after an easy day at the pool. Thinking of 7ish before parade, fireworks?
A lot depends on your eating style, I think, as well as whether you're considering any tummy-unsettling rides.
We usually book all ADR's and then work in the FP's as possible depending hugely upon how likely we are to have oinked out and be moving slower than normal.
But then, the TS we book can easily take priority for us over just about any FP. That's why I suggest taking into consideration how much time your family is likely to spend at a particular restaurant, allow for transit time to the FP and then juggle madly.
I'm probably not much help, huh?
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“People say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing every day.” —Winnie-the-Pooh
For Tusker House, if you are not set on lunch, then I highly recommend their character breakfast buffet. We absolutely loved it !!
We got a time for Tusker that was before park open, so we got to go in early, which was neat itself. We finished at Tusker shortly after park open and were able to then use the FP+ we had scheduled plus walk on to some other rides.
Otherwise, when to schedule them depends on your eating style.
One thing I we have done is plan when in the FP window we do something so we can do an ADR in the middle, e.g.
FP1 0900-1000
FP2 1000-1100
ADR for 0930, figure on an hour, so:
Go to FP1 for 0900; when finished go to ADR hopefully arriving a bit early. Eat for an hour then head to FP2 before its window closes at 11. When doing this, we book the FP and ADR so they are physically close to each other to minimize walking time.
Since you can't plan the fast passes until 2 months, I always plan my meals first. Then 2 months before my trip I work the fast passes around my meals. This trip I did not make them at the 2 months mark- and the choices were not so great. But then a week later I went back and tweeked them again. They are do able and it will work out.
ADRs are always more important first, especially if it is popular one. Best laid plans aren't always the case when planning a Disney trip. I hope you get what you need, but try to be flexible.....
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Kate in PA All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them- Walt Disney
BOG: will hopefully be doing supper after an easy day at the pool. Thinking of 7ish before parade, fireworks?
It could be difficult to impossible to manage doing just BOG dinner at 7:00 and the Wishes fireworks, definitely impossible to do those and the electrical parade.
I suggest allowing at least 90 minutes for dinner at BOG. It can be a while until you're seated, for starters, as crazy busy as BOG dinner is. Then, depending upon how much of a meal you order, it can easily take an hour or more for being served and eating however many courses. Afterward, you'll want to spend at least 15-20 minutes looking around in the rooms which are just gorgeous. Additionally, there's the opportunity to meet The Beast after your meal with all the picture taking associated with a meet & greet. Depending upon how many others are waiting, that can take more than 30 minutes.
With a 7:00 ADR, you could easily get out of the restaurant after Wishes has started. We came out from a 7:00 dinner and meeting Beast just as it began at 9:00.
If you're intent upon working in all three, I suggest trying for a BOG ADR at 5:00 or 5:30 at the latest in order to give you more time to work with.
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“People say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing every day.” —Winnie-the-Pooh
It could be difficult to impossible to manage doing just BOG dinner at 7:00 and the Wishes fireworks, definitely impossible to do those and the electrical parade.
I suggest allowing at least 90 minutes for dinner at BOG. It can be a while until you're seated, for starters, as crazy busy as BOG dinner is. Then, depending upon how much of a meal you order, it can easily take an hour or more for being served and eating however many courses. Afterward, you'll want to spend at least 15-20 minutes looking around in the rooms which are just gorgeous. Additionally, there's the opportunity to meet The Beast after your meal with all the picture taking associated with a meet & greet. Depending upon how many others are waiting, that can take more than 30 minutes.
With a 7:00 ADR, you could easily get out of the restaurant after Wishes has started. We came out from a 7:00 dinner and meeting Beast just as it began at 9:00.
If you're intent upon working in all three, I suggest trying for a BOG ADR at 5:00 or 5:30 at the latest in order to give you more time to work with.
I'd fully endorse everything said here. We had a 6:45pm reservation the last time we ate there and weren't seated for a long time. We got out about 8:50pm and just about made it to see Wishes.
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I am trying to figure out when the best time is to book our ADRS at a few places taking into consideration shows, afternoon breaks, and fastpass. Opinions...
Tusker House: want to do the Nemo show at either 12 or 3. Would a 1:15 ADR be okay.
I don't know this show so can't advise you about times and transit to or from a 1:15 ADR.
Tusker House is a character meal. We usually allow at least 2 hours for those, and that's just time for us two adults to eat as well as chat with characters when they come to our table.
Much depends upon how many kids you have and how interested they'll be in those characters. If your kids are going to want to meet every available character, being seated, eating and waiting to meet all of them could take 2-1/2 hours very easily.
Quote:
Thinking FP at 930, 1030 and 1130?...
CRT: will be there for EMH and then leave to take a nap. Thinking 1ish for ADR and FP at the same 930,1030 and 1130
Something to be aware of is that it depends heavily what FP's you want as to IF you can even get them all. It's unusual for most of us to get all the ones we want on the first try and an absolute miracle to get them spaced as regularly and evenly as you're hoping for.
You will have to grab whatever times you can get for most of them, hoping you can get them fairly close together. And by "fairly close together," I mean that you might have one at 9:25 and the others at 10:45 and 12:30 at best.
What works for us is to book as many as we can as close as possible to our preferred times and go back in later every so often to see if we can cancel and change them. We usually choose only one per day that's a gotta-have and then grab any others we really want whenever they're available. Thus it's not unusual for us to have several hours from one to the next. That's just how it has to be sometimes.
Scheduling FP's can be chaotic in the extreme because you'll oftentimes find yourself grabbing any available time that you could make work for the most-wanted ones like Anna/Elsa Meet & Greet or Mine Train.
And then, there are the tiers to deal with in Epcot and DHS. You can only book a single Tier 1 attraction, so you can't have, for example, both Test Track and Soarin' as two of your three EP FP's.
I strongly advise reading the PassPorter guidebook info on FastPasses to give you a better sense of which ones you want to try for first and to help you develop a more workable strategy. Sorry to have to tell you, but planning for 9:30, 10:30 and 11:30 isn't realistic.
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“People say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing every day.” —Winnie-the-Pooh
Last edited by Her Dotness; 11-08-2015 at 04:03 PM..
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