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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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We have been to WDW twice and we knew we would be going many more times. We were planning two disney trips in deluxe accomodation one for a christmas time trip and one for our wedding. After looking into DVC I figured out for the money I spent on accomodation on those two trips alone that I could buy a small DVC contract by resale and cover the dues for those years. After those two trips we get Deluxe Villa accomodation for less than POP prices! Thats why I bought into DVC! But I would not have even known about DVC/ discovered resale/ bought in from the UK without all the PPers on the boards help! thanks guys
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Clare Loves Stitch
"sometimes the right path is not the easiest one"
Grandmother Willow - Pocahontas
Proud DVC owner at BWV from March 2011
Another great blog entry! Before I became a member I had stayed very happily at the moderates. I stayed for a free weekend at OKW during a DVC promotion when it was first built and the idea of joining percolated in my brain for a few years. When they announced the building of Boardwalk it coincided with the worsening of my mobility handicap and the thought of being within scooting distance of two parks with deluxe accomodations convinced me to take the plunge. It didn't take long before I passed the break-even point and (aside from dues) have been vacationing "free" ever since. I've also stayed in NYC and the Disneyland Hotel on points. Best investment I've ever made. The few years when I haven't been able to make the trip to WDW I've either banked the points or rented to friends.
I have been a Disney fan for as long as I can remember. I can remember watching the Mickey Mouse Club on T.V. and the world of Disney every Sunday night. Through my teen age years and in to adulthood I kept my love of all things Disney.My first visit to Disneyland was a dream fullfilled,one of the best vacations I ever had. We then began visiting Florida on a yearly basis, and then WDW was built. When we saw the vacation club offering we jumped in with no hesitation and its been one of the best things we ever have done as a family.
We had already been to WDW a few times and looked into it. Since we kept going back we figured it made sense to buy DVC. It was a money saving decision not an emotional one. I would not have considered it if it didn't save us money. We have used our membership a lot and it has paid for itself.
We knew we were taking at least 2-3 Disney trips per year and probably would continue that.
We grew to really love deluxe accomodations and the amentities they offer.
The cost of a few trips in deluxe accomodations would pay for our points.
We wanted the ability to choose our accomodations based on what we needed for each trip and loved the size of the one and two bedroom villas!
We wanted to be able to bring family and friends along for our trips.
We like the flexibility of being able to choose a beach vacation at Vero, Hilton Head and now Hawaii.
Florida is in our future retirement plans and we could use our points for weekend trips.
We love Disney and our trips have made us memories that we could have never had somewhere else!
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We joined DVC because we knew we would travel to WDW at least once a year (and often more than that), and we stay in deluxe accommodations. Also, as a family of 5, we would need two "regular" resort rooms, and this would be way too expensive in light of how often we visit.
When we are in WDW, we really enjoy being together as a family, and making memories that will last a lifetime. We truly feel like we are coming back home every time we go to WDW. You can't put a price on that!
We joined DVC because a couple years ago I was in a serious car accident that completely crushed my right foot. I received a great settlement from it and told my husband the number one thing on my list to do (after paying off some debt) was to take our family to Disney. My kids had never been there and it was something I didn't think we would ever be able to do.
While researching the cost of the trip, my husband came to the conclusion that it would be far more beneficial and cost effective to just buy into DVC. He could not justify spending close to $6 on a 10 day trip without some kind of return (other than memories). So we looked into resale and got a great deal.
It has since paid off in spades! We took two trips last year - one with just the four of us and another later in the year with my mother, oldest son, brother and his family. We took care of the resort arrangements and my brother paid our DVC dues.
This coming January, we will be taking my girlfriend and her family of four on their very first trip. They are paying our annual dues and we are covering the resort.
DVC also ensures that we will be vacationing at least once every two years, if not more, and not just to WDW. It has definitely been one of the best investments we ever made!
I found that I was going once or twice a year and always staying at the Deluxe resorts. Buying into DVC has provided a great deal of flexibility. I have reserved a two bedroom villa at BLT and shared the Food and Wine Festival with my sister and BIL. I was able to give my nephew a villa for a week to use for his honeymoon. And it's so easy now to just go with little preparation as evidenced by our evacuation to WDW after the tornado outbreak last April until the power was restored at home. We definitely use the Annual Pass discount, and get the Tables in Wonderland card. And I am looking forward to using points on an Alaska cruise and perhaps an Adventures by Disney tour in the future.
In all honesty the main reason we bought was because it forced us to make our family vacations a priority. It is so easy to say "we should skip vacation because we have this expense." but when you own a vacation club it is already a bill. We looked into other time shares but the reality is that we want to go to Disney at least once a year so any other club would have been second best. I look forward to many years at the parks and having it available to offer my kids a safe vacation destination when they are old enough to travel on their own.
The other reason is that we trust Disney when it comes to our vacation dollars. If we decide to trade out points to try other destinations I feel confident the accommodation will be decent.
For us it doesn't save money because we tend to go more often than we would have without the club but we are having fun and are happy with the our decision to buy. DVC just makes it too easy to go!! The memories we have made are priceless.
Like a lot of people around here, I'm sorely tempted by anything Disney, and while I would like to say that it wasn't an emotional decision, it was certainly partly emotional. I love the idea that I can always be planning a trip because I always have points to use! It makes me happy, and we have so many wonderful family memories to show for it! All that being said, we go once or twice a year, and have been for 6 years, and we always stay deluxe. It makes financial sense, for sure, to own DVC, which was how I convinced DH!
I first went to Disney as a teenager and can remember sailing across the Seven Seas Lagoon as the fireworks were sparkling across the sky. I made a promise to myself that not only would I return someday, but I'd also bring my family.
We made our first trip in 2005 after I completed my Master's Degree. It was while we were staying at WL in concierge that I first posed the subject to my DH.
He agreed that we would be back and that the quality of what we were getting was clearly worth it. Bought in to DVC that very trip.
It was what kept us all from crying as we waited for our ride to the airport.
Since then we've made memories at OKW, SSR, WL, AKLV, BC, and Vero. We've loved every minute of it!
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), and we stay in deluxe accommodations. Also, as a family of 5, we would need two "regular" resort rooms, and this would be way too expensive in light of how often we visit. 
JulieB 
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