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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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We were now working our way back towards the front because Claire wanted to ride spaceship earth.
We decided to stop in Mexico and take a ride.
Believe it or not, but this queue was also long and they had extra ropes set up along the restaurant for us to go through.
We were behind a Mexican family and they were kind of rude….joking and pushing each other in fun and then as we came to the spot where we would enter the regular queue area they spotted family outside the ropes and told them to join them. The CM asked what they were doing…and then he goes “Oh your family is joining you…..that’s ok”. UM …no it’s not! And they proceeded to let 12-15 more people in line in front of us. I was not too happy about that or with the CM. So we weave around the queue and they are super loud and rowdy now with the whole family there. We get to the boats and we sadly end up with some of them. Claire and I had our own row and they tried to jam too many in another row…and so they try to get in our row and I tell them no. Sorry, but I am not having the rowdy family sitting right next to my child. It was bad enough they were in front of us. A couple ended up going in the row behind us.
We take off and I realized I should’ve asked to wait for the next boat. This was not going to be a pleasant experience at all. They were loud, they sang, they clapped…and what made it worse was they were talking in Spanish, so I couldn’t even eavesdrop on the conversations. And then one person starts taking flash pictures. There is nothing more I hate than flash pictures on the ride….and I spoke up. I knew they understood English and I said “No flash pictures!”. The lady looked at me and pretended to not understand, but I knew she did as did her kid and when she took another I glared at her and the kid tapped her and said “NO flash pictures” and she goes “OH”. Yeah she knew it and was pretending not too. UGH.
I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. It really was a rotten ride. And Claire kept looking at me like these people were crazy.
We headed up towards Spaceship Earth then.
I was checking emails as we walked and I saw a few in my business account, but nothing looked urgent and I had an auto responder going out anyways. Then my co-worker Deb messages me and says “so and so (we’ll call her Cheryl since I am sure she doesn’t want her name used here) emailed you and got your responder. She sees you are in Florida and asked me to see if you wanted Sea World Tickets”. Well garsh darn yes…but I already got free Sea World tickets, so thanks but I will pass. Deb messages back … “She can get you 2 for Busch Gardens then”…Again thanks, but I just can’t fit Busch in this week. We had every day planned and as much as I would love to go there and visit, I just didn’t have the time to this year. And then Deb messages back….”Can you tour Discovery Cove? She can get a tour set up there, but you can’t go for the day since it’s so inclusive and only allow so many people per day”. Um yeah, I think so. I could take time away from my Sea World day and head over there.
So I email Cheryl and let her know that I would love to do that on Tuesday if it would work and she gave me the email of the people who could set that up and after going back and forth a few times over the next 24 hours I was set up to visit Discovery Cove on Tuesday. I was kind of excited to see it as I have heard such good things about it.
There was still a line for Spaceship Earth, but it moved fairly fast and I knew we couldn’t leave before riding it or Claire would never forgive me. And at this point, Epcot was not in the plans for the rest of the week officially. We had hoppers and might come back, but as the official planning went, this was our main day here.
We get in our car and I decided to play it “cool” and put my sunglasses on in the picture they take….and then on we went….
I only took a few pictures and only edited these 2…because I always take a ton and I really didn’t need to do a whole other set of the same thing.
Then we came to the picking of our future, which Claire was pretty much in charge of…..and we see our pictures.
Well that is interesting….I have holes in my eyes!
We were laughing so hard about this and Claire thought it was the coolest thing ever…..Even at 45 I am still cool! I posted the picture on facebook and my friend Cass…who you may remember went to DL with me….replied….”In the Future You have no eyes!”
We had a dinner reservation to head to now, so we started making our way towards that destination.
See the crowds!
Yeah it was annoying as all heck. We tend to be faster walkers and for some reason most others are NOT fast at all. They tend to shuffle in front of us. And then when you go to pass them, they move or all of a sudden expand to twice their original size. Claire made comments more than once about this and how it’s like people see us want to pass and all of a sudden grow!
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Those crowds were crazy! I would not have been so patient if that was my ride through Mexico that's for sure.... but glad you were able to get spaceship earth in even if it means you go eyeless in the future
I hear you about the crowds!!! I get so annoyed when people just dawdle - and then the entire family takes up the entire walkway so you can't pass them And I also feel the same about flash photography on rides.....I am always so careful to turn mine off - and sometimes just say forget it if the monitor light gets bright.
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I would have been extremely put out with the family on the Mexico boat ride too!
The crowds were crazy. My oldest DD just goes nuts when people walk slowly. She just has a fit at the mall when people spread out and walk slow. It is going to be fun in October at WDW!!!
yikes, those crowds were intense! Sorry about your bad experience in Mexico. It amazes me how some people just don't care about others when they are on rides. So rude. Its good to know you are still "cool" to your daughter
Wow, I don't think I've ever seen a line that long at the Gran Fiesta Tour! Sorry you ended up riding with the obnoxious family, I would not have liked that either. Shame on that CM for letting their other family members jump the line! I hear you on the crowds and slow walkers too, I have a natural fast pace when I walk and it's so frustrating to get stuck behind a line of people just shuffling along. I don't even understand how they how they can bear to walk so slow!
Those crowds were crazy! I would not have been so patient if that was my ride through Mexico that's for sure.... but glad you were able to get spaceship earth in even if it means you go eyeless in the future
It was crazy and it was exactly like that all week long.
Who knew I was going to be losing my eyes in the future...and my dauther would think it was cool!
Quote:
Originally Posted by lfredsbo
I hear you about the crowds!!! I get so annoyed when people just dawdle - and then the entire family takes up the entire walkway so you can't pass them And I also feel the same about flash photography on rides.....I am always so careful to turn mine off - and sometimes just say forget it if the monitor light gets bright.
Yep, we did a lot of shuffling this trip, It annoys me when I can't even take a full stride when walking. I don't have long legs either.
People who flash drive me insane....especially because most flash pictures do not come out good on those type of rides anyways. They are better to go flashless.
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Originally Posted by pamcarey
Oh my, I would have been rolling my eyes and sighing loudly at that family on the Grand Fiesta ride.
Lots of eyerolling was done by both of us!
Quote:
Originally Posted by disneydreamer33
I would have been extremely put out with the family on the Mexico boat ride too!
The crowds were crazy. My oldest DD just goes nuts when people walk slowly. She just has a fit at the mall when people spread out and walk slow. It is going to be fun in October at WDW!!!
I was so annoyed and it was one time I just couldn't try and make the best of it.
Yeah we both go nuts with slow walkers too.
Quote:
Originally Posted by kingfamily1129
yikes, those crowds were intense! Sorry about your bad experience in Mexico. It amazes me how some people just don't care about others when they are on rides. So rude. Its good to know you are still "cool" to your daughter
It would be different if they let like 2 or 3. I wouldn't have been happy, but could live with it....but 12-15....thats just taking advantage of it.
I am so glad I was able to reach "cool" with her. I don't do it often....even though I know I am!
Quote:
Originally Posted by JKnott17
Wow, I don't think I've ever seen a line that long at the Gran Fiesta Tour! Sorry you ended up riding with the obnoxious family, I would not have liked that either. Shame on that CM for letting their other family members jump the line! I hear you on the crowds and slow walkers too, I have a natural fast pace when I walk and it's so frustrating to get stuck behind a line of people just shuffling along. I don't even understand how they how they can bear to walk so slow!
I have only seen it long many many years ago..before it was changed to the newest version. It's a shocker to find it that long, but I knew it loaded fast...of course it wouldve been fast without the dozen people that cut in front of us.
I can't stand walking that slow too. Also people who walk right into you holding hands and won't seperate. Claire and I now don't allow it and we won't budge...we left them walk into us and we hit hard. LOL. I mean we seperate at times too, but there are so many cases where I swear people are aiming for us...adults...and I am with a kid.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cam22
More great photos! How cool to score free tickets to Discovery Cove, too.
It was just a tour....but it was a lovely tour!
Quote:
Originally Posted by chezp
Wow, those crowds were crazy! The mission looked like a lot of fun, but what a shame about the ride in Mexico.
It was crazy crowded. It makes me rethink going that time of year again. At least on a cruise the ship can only get so full.
I do love the Yacht and Beach Clubs location and any time I can walk this way is a plus for me.
We were headed to Beaches and Cream, but we were talking too much and didn’t pay attention that we passed the Beach Club.
Once we got to the YC we realized our mistake and had to backtrack.
Squirrel!
We checked in and got our buzzer and literally only had like a 2 minute wait. We ordered waters to start with as it was super-hot.
Now we were here for one main thing….the No Way Jose. This is about the best tasting thing in the world to us. I asked Claire if she wanted any food or just some fries and she said no. I would’ve helped her eat them, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to eat a whole order plus attack Mr. Jose as well, so we just went with him.
After a bit of waiting, our “dinner” arrived. The waitress offered to take our picture….Claire looks so enthused!
I then took this picture and posted it to facebook for the “where are we” game…I did this periodically throughout the trip.
And a couple of pictures of Mr. Jose before we dig in.
And then a few minutes later…..
It was darn good! We really pushed the last of it down though. We had eaten a lot this day, but who could refuse a No Way Jose!
While eating we discussed our options for the evening. We were really hot and getting tired of the crowds. We started to think that perhaps we would just leave and go to the Marriott now. After some more talking we decided that since we had park hoppers, we should make good use of them, so we would go over to Hollywood Studios and ride Star Tours and then head back to POFQ to pick up our car from there and then off to the Marriott.
We paid our bill at B & C and headed out and I believe we stopped off at the rocking chairs where I texted my parents to get the info of where our room was and to let them know our plans.
And after a few minutes we decided to walk to DHS. This would help work off that ice-cream.
And we were chatting away and again, not paying attention and got about halfway to the Swolphin before we realized we made a wrong turn. LOL
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but glad you were able to get spaceship earth in even if it means you go eyeless in the future 
And I also feel the same about flash photography on rides.....I am always so careful to turn mine off - and sometimes just say forget it if the monitor light gets bright.
Liz 
How cool to score free tickets to Discovery Cove, too. 
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The mission looked like a lot of fun, but what a shame about the ride in Mexico. 
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