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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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 still can’t believe I did this, but on a recent business trip I spent a free morning running around Universal Studios Hollywood (my first time there) trying to experience as much as I possibly could before I had to go back to work. But I’m getting ahead of myself…
Let’s start at the beginning.
The cast: Just me. I’m Jen, a somewhere in my mid-30’s (OK, maybe late 30’s) mom of two kids. I’m obligated to mention them here, because they won’t show up in any of the rest of this TR!
Miranda is my 12yo DD, a self-proclaimed bookworm and fan of Tinkerbell (and actually the inspiration for my screen name – it all comes from the day she wore her Tinkerbell sweatshirt with her Tigger-ears headband. The extra “e” is for the bookworm Belle of Beauty and the Beast fame. But I digress….)
Ethan is my 8yo DS, whose latest obsession rotates between Stitch, Pokemon, and Star Wars, and whose career goals include becoming both a rock star and a famous film director.
OK, now that I’ve been the good mom and mentioned my kids, the rest of my TR can be self-absorbed.
The pre-trip details:
Back in January, one of my co-workers asked me to get involved in a new project. We were working with some external partners to set up some focus groups to talk with women who had gestational diabetes during their last pregnancies, and we knew the focus groups would take place in Atlanta (home), Chicago, and Los Angeles. Then my co-worker shared the best news… since she was due to deliver her baby at the end of February, and the focus groups were scheduled for March and April when she would still be on maternity leave, I would get to attend at all three locations!
It started to sink in…. I was getting PAID to fly to the opposite coast and I would be SO CLOSE to Mickey’s very first home. I was scheduled to leave Atlanta on Wednesday morning and return on Friday morning, and since the focus groups would take place in the evenings, that meant I had just about all day free on Thursday. Hmmmm… being the devoted Passporter that I am, those wheels just started turning…. Maybe I could actually visit my favorite mouse…
First, I had to book a hotel. The location for the focus groups was in Hollywood, just about a block from Universal Studios. I found a Holiday Inn Express just down the street. So, now I’d be staying within walking distance of one theme park, but in my heart, I knew I had to at least TRY to get to Disneyland if it was at all possible.
Having never been to Los Angeles before, and having heard all the stories about the traffic in this city, I thought it would be best to consult the experts for some advice. So I posted a query on the DL: Getting there (and back!) forum, asking folks how long it REALLY took to drive from Hollywood to Anaheim. The responses were not encouraging. Don’t get me wrong! I really do appreciate the honesty of all the Passporters who answered my post, but I was a little (OK, a lot) disappointed that it wouldn’t be the quick 30-minute trip that Mapquest said it would be!
Resigned to the fact that I wouldn’t be visiting Mickey, I started reading everything I could find about the Studios.
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Thanks for all the positive feedback! This is my first TR, so I'm glad some of you are enjoying it so far.
Continuing with the saga....
I was still a bit sad that I wouldn’t be able to go to Disneyland, but then again, my kids never would have forgiven me for going without them! So I did lots of web searching. I visited the Universal Studios page and pored over all the attractions, I checked out all of the TR’s and suggestions that PassPorters had to offer (but there weren’t as many as I’d hoped there might be – we’re definitely loyal to the mouse here!), and I even did a general google search to see if I could find other reviews of the Studios.
As always seems to be the case, some reviews were positive, some were negative, and some said absolutely nothing at all! Since I didn’t have to be at work until about 5:00 (or so I thought), I finally decided that heading over to Universal for the day would be worth the trip. But for some reason, I hesitated about buying tickets yet.
That’s when all the plans for the focus groups started to disintegrate. We originally had scheduled one on Wednesday evening from 6-8 pm, and two on Thursday from 6-8 and 8-10 pm. But of course, things change. We were having trouble recruiting enough women to participate, so we needed to change the times and locations.
I won’t bore you with all the variations here, but we went through about two weeks worth of DAILY schedule changes, most of which included one group being held on Thursday from 12-2. I dejectedly assumed that I wouldn’t get to have any fun on this trip after all. Of course, I wasn’t feeling sorry for myself at all….
Finally, TWO DAYS before I was scheduled to leave, we got the final itinerary, and the first group on Thursday wasn’t until 2:00. Hmmm…. I was thinking MAYBE I could squeeze in a quick trip to the Studios. And then I got one more e-mail that cinched it.
It was just junk mail really, but the Coca-Cola company reminded me that I had unused points just waiting to be spent. You see, they’ve got this promotion where they put codes on their caps, and if you log in and register the codes, you get points. Being the Diet Coke addict that I am, I’ve been logging in my points for several months now. Maybe even close to a year. And I hadn’t spent many of them yet. Anyway, they reminded me that one of their sponsors was Universal Studios…..
So I logged in to check things out. I could get $15 off the admission price simply by cashing in a few of my points (I had more than enough). That did it! I redeemed my points, got my online coupon, and went straight to the Studios page to buy my tickets! Printed everything out and I was good to go!
WDW - August 1997 Off Property
WDW - January 2005 AKL
WDW - May 2006 Pop Century
WDW- november-dec 2007 pop century
WDW- dec/jan 2009/2010 pop century
WDW- oct/nov 2012 art of animation
WDW- sept 2013 port Orleans riverside
WDW- july 2015 beach club
About This Page: 
A virgin's Universal quickie
a somewhere in my mid-30’s (OK, maybe late 30’s) mom of two kids. I’m obligated to mention them here, because they won’t show up in any of the rest of this TR! 
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Maybe even close to a year. 
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