National parks, natural beauty and a bit of Disney wonder! COMPLETED - Page 39 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Such a wonderful evening! I'm so glad you all got to go to Palo to make the last evening so memorable. Must have been nice to be able to enjoy being out on deck without a cold, wet wind!
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Yes, I was wondering the same thing! Barb was doing well, but you've gotten quite ahead of her now! Well, now we've seen Sue and Steve's version, and yours and Mark's version...hopefully we'll get the same thumbs up when Barb gets a chance to catch up!
Sounds like yet another wonderful experience at Palo. It's a shame the rest of the dining wasn't as spectacular. Just seeing the smile on Nikolai's face makes the food more appetizing, right? When the server's in a good mood, the food's always better! That being said, the food looked absolutely scrumptious! It looks so good, it must taste amazing! Hmm...I wonder what I can make at home to ease my hunger pains now!!!
You are so right about a happy server, although the food was excellent anyway! I hear you on those hunger pains...
Tuesday 6 September – part one: all ready for dry dock
It was a bit of a disappointing start to the day, as we wanted to see the Wonder sail into Vancouver, so we set the alarm for 5:45am, knowing that it had arrived on our departure day at around 6:15am. When Mark got up, we were already in port so sorry, no photos of us arriving back. I did get some from the room of the view however a little later, so these will have to do!
We went back to sleep for a little bit, but then it was time to get up, as I had a lot of additional comments to make about the cruise, as well as filling out our survey. I went through a number of things, including:
Some praise for Cast Members who made our cruise magical
The fact that we’d like to see more weather proofing done to the ship, especially around the adult pool, which had been deserted pretty much all cruise.
The late dining, which hadn’t really worked for us, at the slightly later time, as it meant we were going to bed on full stomachs.
The poor menu on Pirate Night and the fact that I had to send entrees back.
The lack of dining rooms for lunch on the last at sea day.
How good the scrapbooking and Art of Entertaining sessions were.
How we’d like to see some of the ideas from the Dream coming on board here, like the ability to pause movies in your stateroom.
It ended up running to three pages, but hopefully it’s all useful feedback for Disney... As a postscript, I was actually very disappointed that, having gone to all that trouble, I didn’t get any real response from Disney. I got a card in the mail in October time, thanking me for taking the time to give my feedback, which was nice, but I would have liked them to respond to some of my feedback.
Once that was done, we went down to hand it into guest services, as I didn’t want to just put it in a box and Mark went upstairs to Shutters to pick up our CD. He was waiting for me, as Margerita was working on there and we went and thanked her once again for being such a wonderful photographer and getting so many great photos of us during the cruise.
We walked back, with me heading for the room and Mark heading up to deck nine to see what was going on up there. It was 8:00am and I swear nearly everyone was out of their room. The line to get into breakfast at Parrot Cay was stretching back through the Promenade Lounge, with half an hour to go before breakfast there.
We headed up to deck ten to take a look around and we got some stunning views of the Vancouver skyline, but more amazing to see was the transformation that the Wonder was already undergoing for its upcoming dry dock. The pools were all drained and the handrails were already covered up, waiting for work to start. It was quite something to see.
By the time we’d walked all around the deck, we were at the appointed time for our Parrot Cay breakfast, 8:30am. We spotted Sue and Steve in the line, so joined them and joined the others, minus Amy, who apparently wasn’t coming, as her flight was early and she was one of the first off the ship.
I grabbed some lox and bagels and some cereal, along with pineapple juice and tea. It wasn’t a bad menu, but certainly not as good as the last few days at Triton’s.
Soon, sadly breakfast was finishing and Barb and Bob were the first to head off and we said some very sad and sorry goodbyes to them. We had had such a great time with them and I hope we get to do it again with them soon. We talked to Sue and Steve later in the day about 2015 for Mark’s 50th and perhaps the last of the season, if Disney are still cruising Alaska then? Let’s hope so!
It's amazing what Disney cast members can get done when everyone is sound alseep. Sorry to see the cruise come to and end, but I'm excited to see what's in store for the rest of your trip.
How sad to say goodbye to the ship and your good friends! Sure looks like DCL was anxious for the Alaska cruise season to end-- that was an early arrival into Vancouver and early start to the refurbishing.
It was great that you took the time and effort to give DCL such useful feed-back and I agree, it would have been nice if they'd acknowledged your extra effort with a follow-up.
It's nice to have the cruise end, but not the trip and trip report. Looking forward to the rest of your amazing trip.
Sorry to see this portion of your trip come to a close. It's great that you were able to enjoy it with good friends, though! Now I'm looking forward to hear more about the rest of your trip!
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Sorry that the cruise is ending and the sad goodbyes are starting . I think it's great that you took the time to give DCL such useful feedback, and included the good as well as the bad. It's too bad they didn't give a more personal response.
Dinner at Palo sounded like a wonderful way to end your cruise. Good thing that reservation could be made for all of you! The photo of all the green drinks is cute - cheers!
Wow, Disney sure didn't waste any time getting the Wonder ready for work. Holy cow! That looked very strange to see the pool empty!
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I hear you on those hunger pains...
Katie's graduation
Sorry the day is starting off with goodbyes! 
The photo of all the green drinks is cute - cheers! 
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