To Alaska and Beyond! Updated 4/28 x 3 and it's COMPLETE!! - Page 24 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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I just finished your cruise with the girls which was Great, and was so happy you had a thread to your Alaskan cruise. Can't wait to enjoy this TR as much as I did the other!! Happy Cruising LouigiAnne
And another cool footnote- it turns out that another Passporter was on our sailing and their family was present at Finish the Lyrics. Haven't heard from him/her in awhile, so maybe if they check in with the report, they might be able to chime in. But what an amazingly small world. No pun intended. Well, maybe somewhat.
I am the "missing" passporter! I've been busy myself, and have tried to reply back a couple times with pictures... but once I finally figured out how to do it, and that I would need to resize each of the pictures I wanted to upload... I just gave up. I don't have the patience for all that! Between picking the pictures I want to post, resizing them, uploading, AND writing a fun post..... Maybe one of these days soon I will add some pictures when I have more time! Anyway, I would love to add some info from my experience on the cruise too!
I think I said this before, but our cruise director was really awesome. This was our 4th cruise, and I think he was our best yet. We had Ken Rush on our last cruise; my husband thought he was better... But I really liked Mike!
We also went to the cinema.... on the 1st day at sea (VERY COLD outside!). We watched Housebunny.... dumb, dumb, dumb movie! As we were walking out, I heard a couple in their 50s or 60s comment "I can't believe we actually sat through that whole thing!" I agree, but it was something to do. On our other 3 cruises we have always been so busy doing other things, I was happy that we got a chance to try out the cinema.
We ate in the dining room each night for dinner but one (went to Portofino that night). We had first seating, at 6PM, with 11 other members of our family. We had a blast, and loved our servers. Loved the food too. I think the food was better this cruise than our last. Portofino was excellent also.
The glacier was amazing... Definitely our favorite day on the trip! And the chunk of glacier ice was raised right in front of our balcony. Literally. I have a couple pictures of my husband with the chunk right behind his head! And I got some great pics of the cruise director staff on the boat attempting to get the glacier chunk, and then fastening it to the rope to raise it to the top deck of the ship once they arrived back. Thank you super-zoom lens!
We watched Finish the Lyrics! So, although statelady may never have seen me, I did see her! She did do an excellent job. If I remember correctly, one of the contestants might have been the "newlywed wife" contestant on the Love & Marriage Game Show. They got married on the ship before we set sail, and had LOTS of family/friends on the ship. The whole group was quite loud at events throughout the cruise... I bet they were the ones booing! Aaaaaaaaaaaaand.... statelady definitely new her Van Halen! The ending was classic... where the answer was accidently blurted out by the staff, but it didn't matter.
Okay... I think that is pretty much catches me up the the trip report. Wow. this took a lot longer than I expected, and is exactly why I don't normally post very often. It takes me too long, I haven't even read my post again to ensure it makes any sense! I can't wait to read the rest of the trip report so I can compare more of it to mine!
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MVC Owner - HHI, Myrtle Beach, Branson, Orlando
DVC Owner - VWL
Yearly trips (or more!) to Orlando since 2007
WDW Resorts: BLT, SSR, WL, POR, CBR
8 cruises on Royal Caribbean, 2 on DCL
Yay! It's Friday and I am exhausted and in need of serious stress relief, soooo thought I would go back in time and update a bit!
I managed to convince the boys to attend a show so we headed up to the Tropical Theatre. Matt wanted to be high up in the balcony so we headed up there. He and Aaron wanted to sit a bit closer to stage right than we did, so we let them.
The performer, Johnathan Clark was a musical impressionist/ comedian. He did some amazingly spot on impressions of Elton John, George Michael, Bruce Springsteen and others. He also threw the standard cruise ship comedy in there too- which was actually pretty funny.
The show lasted around an hour and Matt really had a great time. Johnathan was out in the lobby, selling his CD and greeting folks. At the time, Matthew wanted to go by and meet him, but when we got up to the front of the line- my child got super shy and I ended up in the picture with him. The guy looked like he had sweated off about 10 pounds. The picture Matt took of us was pretty funny.
We headed back to the room as we were all pretty tired and we had an early morning. Marcilano stopped by with a note from the Musher's Camp- which was our excursion in Skagway the following morning. Our cart pull (where the dogs pull you on a summer time version of the sled) had been canceled. Evidently, the weather was so unseasonably warm, there was concern for the dogs' health and ability to do that in such temps. We all were really disappointed- but completely understood.
Coming Up Next: The only bear I will ever see.....
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LouigiAnne
Disney Magic - Oct 2015
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