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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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View Poll Results: Which park would you give up if you only had three days at WDW?
Who: Me and Muffin, of course! Also Katie for a small part of the trip.
What: A 3 night Disney Dream Cruise followed by a week at the Rosen Orlando
When: November 8th-November 18th
Where: The Disney Dream, Universal Studios, Disney World for me!!
Why: Muffin has his annual convention and we love the parks at the holidays and we want to try a Merrytime Christmas Cruise!!
Although we won't be going for a while, I wanted to start this PTR today to let you guys know how this trip came about. As you all know, Muffin has an annual convention in Orlando in November and we normally build a Disney trip around it. This year, we are doing so many other things that we decided to skip WDW for a year and instead, just enjoy the Orlando area as we know there is plenty to do here! Well, that all sounds very good but the truth is.......................
Muffin was ready to take a break from WDW and I can't pretend I wasn't a tad bit disappointed. . Still, we really are planning a lot of trips and I was honestly happy to get my holiday Orlando fix. So!
Our original plan was to fly down to Orlando on November 11th. Muffin’s Show is from the 13th-16th and we figured this would give us a couple of days to settle in and go to a park or two before it started.
With WDW off the table, we looked at both Universal and Sea World. Neither Park would have any Christmas festivities until the 17th, so we added a couple of days after the show to our vacation so we could get a little holiday fix in and changed our arrival date to November 12th.
We surfed around a little more and in our web travels, what should pop up but the Very Merrytime Christmas cruise on the Dream! I did not hold out much hope as we really were trying to be budgety about whole trip, but Muffin was intrigued. Besides, I think he felt a tad bit guilty about changing the Fantasy Cruise we had booked ( even though we had a great time on the Oasis).
We checked the dates and looked up some you tube videos and decided to go ahead and book the November 9-12 cruise!! I hardly needed any explanation for this addition to our trip but Muffin reasoned that this would be a great way to get in a little Disney holiday magic without the expense of WDW. This made me feel so much better as well, about not going to the Parks this year!!
The total additional cost including ground transportation came to around 2,000 bucks. I had 400 dollars in Disney gift cards to put towards it plus more than enough left from my Oasis cruise winnings, so the net upgrade came to 0 bucks!! We will be staying in a Verandah stateroom midship on Deck 10. We honestly loved the magical porthole inside stateroom we had last time but it was only 150 more for the Verandah, so we thought we’d try it out!
I am very glad that we put this on the front end of our trip because I think it will swim by quickly!! . There are no sea days on this cruise. It will stop at Nassau and Castaway Cay. It sure looks like there is plenty of Christmas fun, though!!
Having settled this part of the vacation, we are now trying to work out the rest of the trip! Since Muffin will be working from the 13th-16th, I am looking at a couple of options.
Of course, I had to check out a 3 day park pass for Disney, but it is pretty steep at 305 dollars for three days and that’s without the hopper option. I was also considering going to Disney Springs for a day but we are planning on eating dinner there at least once as well, so that may be overkill. I did Discovery Cove last year and loved it but it’s too soon to go back. I was thinking I would just spread out my time at Universal Studios and maybe go to Sea World.
Also, since we are doing the cruise on the front end of our trip, Muffin was thinking we may not stay after his show. If we decided to go that route, I would just visit Universal while Muffin is working. I would, however, have complained for a year that Muffin made me miss the Macy’s Day Parade and Mannheim Steamroller!
I also mentioned that Katie would be joining us for few days. She is coming down just to do the show with Muffin from the 13-16th. We are planning to eat dinner at Disney Springs at least one of those nights and possibly two. With all of the new restaurant choices, we have some thinking to do in this department. Muffin definitely wants to check out the Edison so that will be a must.
Next thing I know, Muffin turned to me and said, " Hey, you won most of the money on the cruise so if you want to go to WDW while I am working, that's fine." !! You guys know I would never turn that offer down, so it looks like I will be incorproating WDW into this trip as well!! I just need to decide if I want to spring for an annual pass, since we will be returning for sure next year or I just want to get a 2 or 3 day ticket. It seems I need to work on an itinerary to figure that out!
He also told me that we would definitely be staying through the 18th so that we could see the Macy's Parade and Mannheim Steamroller!! This made me over the moon happy!!
I will post more when I get some sort of plan together for this trip!!
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Sounds like another great trip! A lot of things up in the air regarding some of the major plans for it and hope it comes together soon and to your liking of what you really want. The three day pass is a bit expensive for three days. They don't become cost efficient until about the first day.
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October 6, 2017-Enjoying an amazing dinner at Victoria & Albert's with PP's Dot and Drew
My TR from my most recent trip is now underway. Includes: Universal Studios Florida, Disney World and Sea World Orlando Trifecta TR -Updated December 10th! TR is now COMPLETED!
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What a lovely way to spend your winnings. Having said that, I think without them, Disney World would be off the table - it is getting stupidly expensive, isn't it?
Great plans!! It sounds like the best of all worlds! Isn't it crazy how much WDW tickets are for 2-3 days. Definitely the least cost effective time period, as they want us to stay longer, but sometimes that isn't possible.
Another trip!! That's awesome! Can't wait to hear all the changes, err, I mean your plans.
Some things never change, Mayra!! I'm sure there will be some revisions along the way!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by cubfancolleen
What a great way to use those winnings! So you can keep sailing RCCL to fund your DCL cruises!
Exactly!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by pamcarey
Great plans!! It sounds like the best of all worlds! Isn't it crazy how much WDW tickets are for 2-3 days. Definitely the least cost effective time period, as they want us to stay longer, but sometimes that isn't possible.
Yeah, I'm still not sure what to do with tickets. They are really getting ridiculous!!
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. Still, we really are planning a lot of trips and I was honestly happy to get my holiday Orlando fix. So!
We will be staying in a Verandah stateroom midship on Deck 10. We honestly loved the magical porthole inside stateroom we had last time but it was only 150 more for the Verandah, so we thought we’d try it out!
. There are no sea days on this cruise. It will stop at Nassau and Castaway Cay. It sure looks like there is plenty of Christmas fun, though!! 
I was also considering going to Disney Springs for a day but we are planning on eating dinner there at least once as well, so that may be overkill. I did Discovery Cove last year and loved it but it’s too soon to go back. I was thinking I would just spread out my time at Universal Studios and maybe go to Sea World.
It seems I need to work on an itinerary to figure that out!
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Having said that, I think without them, Disney World would be off the table - it is getting stupidly expensive, isn't it? 
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