A very personal Decade of Dreams tour! UPDATED 6/5 - Page 52 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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.
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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.
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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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Amazing pictures...those cherry blossoms look good at all times I remember one of the night pictures that I thought was just perfect, but then seeing them in the glistening sun they are beautiful as well. Glad that the weather shaped up for you today (make up for the rain you had the other day).
Wow ... not a cloud in the sky, and I notice now that neither of you are bundled up! This set of pictures was great as usual, funny you should say it is the newest shrine (only 100 years old!). Of course here in America that would be considered ancient. So the thing I don't get about the mobile dog groomer is why there was an American flag on the vehicle? I could understand maybe both American and Japanese flags. Interesting. But a mobile dog groomer is a cool idea!
Wow ... not a cloud in the sky, and I notice now that neither of you are bundled up! This set of pictures was great as usual, funny you should say it is the newest shrine (only 100 years old!). Of course here in America that would be considered ancient. So the thing I don't get about the mobile dog groomer is why there was an American flag on the vehicle? I could understand maybe both American and Japanese flags. Interesting. But a mobile dog groomer is a cool idea!
Well spotted - today was the first day that it really started to warm up.
The dog grooming company could well be run by an American?
Monday 6 April – part three: so many Shinkansen...
Our next stop was the huge red Torii gate that had first attracted our attention when we left the shrine. You can’t miss the thing, as it’s massive.
We walked a bit further and found a 7/11, where I found a box of sushi and Mark found a bento box, although when he got to the till, they asked if he wanted it cooked now. OK, we didn’t realise that. He said yes and then we sat outside in the beautiful weather with him enjoying his food.
After that was finished with, we carried on walking down the road and crossed one of Kyoto’s river, which made for some lovely photos.
We soon found the subway station and, from there, it was back to the hotel, where we picked up the luggage and despite our previous bad experience with taxis in Kyoto, we decided to take one to the station. This one partly restored our faith, as our driver did everything he could to get us there quickly, but safely. When we arrived, we got out a 2000¥ note and he gave it back to me, as he didn’t have any change on him. I wasn’t going to have that, after he’s been so good, so we scrambled around a bit and managed to find two 500¥ coins, so that we could pay him. What a decent and sweet guy.
We caught the elevator up to the station and quickly found our way to the platform. There was only one problem, we were so early for our train that it wasn’t even showing up on the overhead boards. To kill time, I went to have a look at all the bento boxes in the shops here. There were amazing. Another Western couple came in and we were all standing there with our jaws open, looking at what was in front of us. It was a lovely sight.
Eventually, I managed to decide on one, as I figured that may be my dinner tonight, or if there was a fridge in the room, then maybe it could even be lunch tomorrow.
That done, it was up to the platform, where we were able to watch the Shinkansen come and go in the 25 minutes that we were there for. We saw about three or four in that time. I never realised that there were so many of these things. The closest we really have to them is the Eurostar and, as there are only two or three of these at the most in an hour. That’s what I thought the Shinkansen would be like, but not at all. :
At times, there were only a couple of minutes in between each of them. It was an amazing sight and it was great just to sit there and watch these beautiful machines glide in and out of the station.
Ours glided in dot on time (well, you wouldn’t expect anything less, would you?!) and we prepared to board, only the people coming off were a bit slow and there was a huge gap in between them. The woman in front of us boarded and Mark was halfway on, when more people started coming off. Still, we managed fine and quickly took our seats, which this time included a window seat at long last!
It seemed to take us some time to get out of Kyoto...
... and then almost as soon as we were, we were slowing back down again to head into Osaka station. They are only about 10 minutes apart. I knew they were close together, but never realised that they were that close. From what we could see of the city, it looked very industrial, which fits in with everything that I had read about Osaka in the guidebooks.
Cheryl I love your update and the pictures as usual! In your previous post, I would have been dying of laughter seeing a On the Go Doggy Groomer (or as Skyler would say "Dog Dog"). Looking foward to your next installment with the view I'm glad you were able to finally get window seats as well!
Wow, Cheryl, how on earth did I miss this TR so far? I just read through the whole thing and I love all the beautiful pictures, especially of the cherry blossoms Believe it or not but I do recognize a few places from when I visited Japan over 10 years ago. Can't wait to read more about this wonderful trip of yours!
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Pixie Dust
Disney Magic - Oct 2015
So the thing I don't get about the mobile dog groomer is why there was an American flag on the vehicle? I could understand maybe both American and Japanese flags. Interesting. But a mobile dog groomer is a cool idea!
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I'm glad you were able to finally get window seats as well!
I just read through the whole thing and I love all the beautiful pictures, especially of the cherry blossoms 
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