Just call us Holly, Heidi and Honey - Page 8 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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!
Welcome! We're happy you've found the PassPorter Community -- the friendliest place to plan your vacation to Walt Disney World, Disney Cruise Line, Disneyland, and the world in general! You are now viewing the PassPorter Message Board Community as a guest, which gives you limited access. As our guest, feel free to browse our messages by selecting the forum you want to visit from the list below.
To post messages and ask questions, join our FREE community today and you'll get access to tools and resources not available to guests, such as our vacation countown timers, "living" avatars, private messaging system, database searches, downloads, and a special PassPorter discount code. Registration is fast, simple, and completely free. Just click the Join Our Community link.
If you think you've already joined, log in below now. If you don't remember your member name or password, please visit our Member Name and Password Recovery page. You are also welcome to contact us.
It was time for our Soarin’ FP’s, so we said to WS for now and headed back to FW. On the way, we had a little photo opportunity!
We were almost to The Land when we spotted Sleeping Beauty without a line. She was really in character and even told us that we reminded her of her fairy godmothers. She may have been a little too much in character because Ramona thought she was a bit on the coo coo side.
We didn’t wait too long in Soarin’ and ended up with Row 1 without even having to ask. This was Carol’s first time and she absolutely loved it. Of course, Ramona felt like she had come home.
Next we went over to TT since Carol had never ridden it either. The standby line was long so we decided to do the single rider line. Ramona had decided to sit out this one since she didn’t like the sound of the cars zooming by.
I sent her through the back way since I knew she would enjoy checking out the cars. Carol and I went right into a pre-show room and were soon riding in the same car. She loved this ride too. We met Ramona in the showroom where, sure enough, she had found her car (a bright yellow sports car ).
We had originally planned to head to our ADR at ‘Ohana directly from Epcot, but since we had pretty much finished what we had hoped to accomplish today we decided to head back to AKL and get situated in our room. We didn’t want to leave without riding SE when we saw that it was a walk on (I had earlier explained to the ladies that you didn’t want to ride it on the way in - - always on the way out when there’s never a line ). Carol sat behind Ramona and me and gave us rabbit ears during the picture, so we had big divets in our head.
On the way out, we saw Stitch and Daisy without a line. Thankfully Carol had the Photopass photographers take duplicates of all of our PP pictures with her camera because we ended up with the picture of the couple in front of us with Daisy instead of our own from our PP card.
Carol or Ramona let it slip that Carol had been kissing on Daisy's man, so Daisy gave Carol a little attitude. Eventually she made up with her though.
A bus was waiting so we were soon at Jambo House. Carol went to get the car while I grabbed a bellman to unload our luggage. I was a bit confused when the bellman told me that he would give me the claim ticket and I could either ask for our luggage inside at the bell stand or call when we got to our room. As we were going to our room right then, I had just assumed that he would follow us to the room, but he explained that he couldn’t take the luggage inside. I guess I had never been in this specific situation before because this was news to me. Okay, I’ll play along.
While Carol parked the car, Ramona and I went inside and I gave the claim ticket to a CM whom I remember from our stay in 2008 - - Vanessa. She was tickled that I remembered her and told us that she would have the luggage to us soon. Ramona and I were going to wait for Carol, but Ramona saw that she was taking a call outside so we figured we would just see her in the room.
Vanessa had told us to take a left from the lobby and then take the elevator down the hall. Well, Ramona and I walked and walked and walked and then found the elevator. We took it to the fifth floor and then walked and walked and walked some more. Our room was only a few doors down from the end of the hotel. We had fun joking every time that we came back from a park that we had to stop in the lobby and warm up for the big walk.
A few minutes after we were in our room, Carol called and, not surprisingly given our room location, was lost. I directed her back down to the lobby and gave her the directions that Vanessa had given us. Soon enough, Carol and Vanessa found the room. We unpacked a little, checked out our view and then rested our feet before our long walk back down to the bus stop.
__________________
Sometimes words aren't needed . . .
Last edited by Jillybean; 12-02-2010 at 09:00 AM..
What a sneaky, yet awesome little girls getaway. Just joining in here and loving it so far. Thom is awesome for making sure you got to go, my hubs would have been the same way.
Guess that walk to your room might come in handy at night after a few FAB's, walk it off, walk it off.
Can't wait to hear about O'hana, that is our all time fave!!!
Registered Message Board Members Get Our Free Newsletter! When you register you'll have the option to sign up for our weekly PassPorter Newsletter. It's chock-full of feature articles; news; tips; contests; photos; and special offers in our online store.
What a fun day at Epcot! Love Carol kissing Donald and then Daisy giving her attitude! I've been in one of those rooms at the very end of the hall! It used to take 8 minutes to get to it from the lobby (yes, I timed it ).
__________________
Mickey's so happy to see me back, he can barely contain himself!
45 minutes from "eyes open" to "out the door?"
Sounds like Karen was with you guys.
As if! If I was with them they wouldn't have wasted time on stopping for breakfast along the way. I would have scheduled in enough time in that 45 minutes to grill up some French toast on the iron and cook a couple of eggs over the in room radiator.
But even though I wasn't there to keep things moving along at top efficiency, Jill, I am just absolutely loving this trip. What a blast!
__________________
Karen, aka Zack's Mom - Lover of all Things Disney and the San Francisco Giants!
PassPorter's Free-Book to Walt Disney World It’s hard to believe anything is free at Walt Disney World; but there are actually a number of things you can get or do for little to no cost. This e-book documents over 200 free or cheap tips to do before you go and after you arrive. You could save a considerable amount of money following these tips. Perhaps more importantly; you can discover overlooked attractions and little-known details most people whiz by on their way to spend money. Click here to see free sample pages from the e-book! Get this popular e-book free of extra charges when you join the PassPorter's Club for as little as $4.95. A club pass includes access to all our other e-books; e-worksheets; super-size photos; and more! This e-book is also available for separate purchase in the PassPorter Online Store for just $5.95.
As if! If I was with them they wouldn't have wasted time on stopping for breakfast along the way. I would have scheduled in enough time in that 45 minutes to grill up some French toast on the iron and cook a couple of eggs over the in room radiator.
But even though I wasn't there to keep things moving along at top efficiency, Jill, I am just absolutely loving this trip. What a blast!
OMG Karen, you make me laugh so hard! And it's only because I am the exact same way. Why the heck would you waste time EATING when you are enroute to DISNEY?!?
__________________
Saturday, October 9, 2014 - Kaitlyn and I before the Happy Haunted 5K at ESPN Wide World of Sports
A bus for the MK came fairly quickly and then we took the monorail to the Poly. As soon as we checked in at ‘Ohana, we were told that they were backed up about 20 or 30 minutes.
The lobby area and bar were packed, but we were able to find three chairs off to the side of the bar. A CM working in the bar was nice enough to find a drinks menu for me and told me that we would actually have quicker service if we went up to the bar instead of going through him. Not often you find someone willing to give up a tip.
We took a while to peruse the drinks menu before Carol and I decided on the Superfruit Martini and Ramona went with a Captain’s Mai Tai. I was able to quickly place our order at the bar and then Ramona came up and paid for them as a treat for us. It was probably only about 15 minutes after our original ADR time when our buzzer went off. Our cousin took us to our table which was right on the edge of the aisle and gave us a front row seat for the action (which could be scary at times ).
We dug right into the bread, salad, and other appetizers. Both Carol and Ramona really enjoyed everything. I hadn’t been here in a couple of years and noticed how much more tender the meat is. The shrimp and the steak were particularly delicious and I think that Ramona could have eaten her weight in shrimp.
When we weren’t eating, we had plenty of built-in entertainment right in front of us. Ramona actually had to move her drink several times to keep it from getting hit by maracas or brooms and we had several coconuts go under our table also.
We kept teasing Ramona about her mai tai all night because it was so strong that it took her the entire meal to drink it. Carol and I each took a sip and almost passed out. If we had been sitting any closer to where they cook the meat, we would have all gone up into flames.
When the hula started, we took that as our cue to leave. We hopped a waiting monorail and were at MK in no time. Wishes was about to start so we snuck through the stores to the right and then cut over to Tomorrow Land. First up was the People Mover where we had a great view of Wishes.
We then rode Buzz which was a first for them and they loved it (At the end of the week, Ramona voted it her #2 favorite ride after Soarin’ ). There was hardly a wait for the race cars, so that was our next stop. We had to tease Ramona because she has a reputation for being a fast driver. At one point, she actually squealed the tires on her car.
Ramona did really not want to ride Splash Mountain, but the amount of rum that she had consumed in her Captain’s Mai Tai enabled Carol and me to convince her. She sat beside me and kept her head down the entire time. On the ride photo, you couldn’t even see her. Oh, she was cracking us up!
We barely got wet on the ride, but after the big drop, we noticed that it was sprinkling. Thankfully, the rain had stopped by the time that we got off the ride. I had brought tons of dollar stores ponchos with me and always had three in my purse because rain was predicted every day of our trip, but you know how it never rains when you have an umbrella? The same thing holds true for ponchos because it sprinkled for a minute that night and the last morning of our trip and that was it!
After we traumatized Ramona on Splash, we moved on to a tamer boat ride in the form of PotC and then we mosied out of the park. We had a long day and we were pooped.
On the way out, we took one final picture.
Unfortunately, we weren’t getting back to AKL anytime soon because the line at the bus stop was huge . We finally made it on the third bus to AKL, but we managed to get a seat so it was worth the wait.
Once back at AKL, we made the long walk down the hall. Our invitation to the Sunset Safari was there, so I was able to spring my surprise on the girls! They were very excited!
Carol and Ramona always laughed at how quickly I got into my pj’s each night! I was asleep almost as soon as my head hit the pillow. Those comfy beds are pure heaven when you’re as tired as we were!
__________________
Sometimes words aren't needed . . .
Last edited by Jillybean; 12-02-2010 at 03:53 PM..
Love the shenanigans with Donald and Daisy!!! Too funny! You guys sure got some great things accomplished. That Mai Tai sounds sooooo good right now......
__________________
Tanya
Every click helps feed .6 bowls of food to rescued animals. Give a quick click every day and help animals in shelters! www.theanimalrescuesite.com
About This Page: 
Like
Thank
Pixie Dust
to WS for now and headed back to FW. On the way, we had a little photo opportunity! 
She was really in character and even told us that we reminded her of her fairy godmothers. She may have been a little too much in character because Ramona thought she was a bit on the coo coo side. 
We met Ramona in the showroom where, sure enough, she had found her car (a bright yellow sports car 
).
). Carol sat behind Ramona and me and gave us rabbit ears during the picture, so we had big divets in our head. 
Eventually she made up with her though.
I guess I had never been in this specific situation before because this was news to me. Okay, I’ll play along. 
We had fun joking every time that we came back from a park that we had to stop in the lobby and warm up for the big walk. 
Katie's graduation
PassPorter Guide Author
I've been in one of those rooms at the very end of the hall! It used to take 8 minutes to get to it from the lobby (yes, I timed it 
I would have scheduled in enough time in that 45 minutes to grill up some French toast on the iron and cook a couple of eggs over the in room radiator. 
Previous trips: POFQ 2005 & 2007, Boardwalk 2008, BCV & AKLV 2009 (our honeymoon) & 2012, BCV & BLT 2011, BCV 2013, AKLV 2014
OMG Karen, you make me laugh so hard! And it's only because I am the exact same way. Why the heck would you waste time EATING when you are enroute to DISNEY?!? 
I was able to quickly place our order at the bar and then Ramona came up and paid for them as a treat for us. 
It was probably only about 15 minutes after our original ADR time when our buzzer went off. Our cousin took us to our table which was right on the edge of the aisle and gave us a front row seat for the action (which could be scary at times 
).
Thankfully, the rain had stopped by the time that we got off the ride. I had brought tons of dollar stores ponchos with me and always had three in my purse because rain was predicted every day of our trip, but you know how it never rains when you have an umbrella? The same thing holds true for ponchos because it sprinkled for a minute that night and the last morning of our trip and that was it! 
Linear Mode
