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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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.
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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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How do you all make your plans for FP+ for a week long trip? I did it for the day for our trip a few weeks ago, but have no idea where to start for our week long trip Sept 15.
We went at it a lot more casually last fall since our trip then was shortly after the big change to advance scheduling. So, we just grabbed what we could get whenever, not having to plan based on what we could get on a certain park day since we always get ParkHopper. That's another reason why we would never go without PH, its big advantage being the ability to schedule what you want wherever.
This year, we're drafting a list of our own "first tier" ones like Mine Train and Test Track along with possibly a few Meet & Greets. We'll grab as many of those as don't conflict with our ADR's and plug in whatever else we can get from the less-populars and ones we could easily live without.
Annoys me that we have to schedule FP's for the hot attractions or wait an eternity in standby anymore for those. I really enjoyed trip planning more when we didn't bother with FP's because just a few years ago WDW wasn't as crowded at less-busy times of year as it's become.
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“People say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing every day.” —Winnie-the-Pooh
We went at it a lot more casually last fall since our trip then was shortly after the big change to advance scheduling. So, we just grabbed what we could get whenever, not having to plan based on what we could get on a certain park day since we always get ParkHopper. That's another reason why we would never go without PH, its big advantage being the ability to schedule what you want wherever.
This year, we're drafting a list of our own "first tier" ones like Mine Train and Test Track along with possibly a few Meet & Greets. We'll grab as many of those as don't conflict with our ADR's and plug in whatever else we can get from the less-populars and ones we could easily live without.
Annoys me that we have to schedule FP's for the hot attractions or wait an eternity in standby anymore for those. I really enjoyed trip planning more when we didn't bother with FP's because just a few years ago WDW wasn't as crowded at less-busy times of year as it's become.
I was wondering how it would work with PH, seems to me like it cuts down on the spontaneity of hopping. I changed our dates to the end of September/beginning of October to hopefully avoid some of the crowds, so that may help with lines for the headliners.
I'll get our must-do's together and go from there.
We only found last fall that we had to factor in travel time more carefully so that we didn't schedule a lunch in the MK, for instance, that was going to be so leisurely that we'd have to scramble to get to Epcot for our TT FP. It would be easier if you eat lots of QS. We prefer TS and want mostly upscale TS where we're quite likely to take well over an hour eating and commenting on the food.
Even though you've got an hourlong window in which to use an FP, you can easily miscalculate or encounter a travel snafu that leaves you dashing to get to that FP attraction in time. And having to allow for our savoring every bite means we must plan for travel from food to fun much more carefully than those for whom just about any food grabbed on the go will do.
We think PH still very much worth its cost even with the hassle of working FP times around ADR's. Flexibility in booking ADR's wherever we want to eat trumps other concerns for us whereas it may not for others. Never guess that eating well is our top priority and the fun gets fit in around that, would you? I know. We're weird.
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“People say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing every day.” —Winnie-the-Pooh
This is my first trip with the FP+ and I can't say I'm overly excited about it. I am a planner so you'd think this would be ideal for me, but it's just adding to the stress. Anyway, I started with the parks I want to go to each day and then I added the ADR's. We do mostly sit down's as well. I'm planning on more half day's at each park instead of whole days this time, which is different. The plan is to get to DHS and Epcot twice so we have double the days to get the good rides. I'm hoping to get early rides and have them done before a later lunch. The hope is to then hit a kiosk for fireworks for the evening. I have no idea how it will work out. I'm really feeling like the key to accomplishing a lot is being at the gate at rope drop. The last time we were in Disney the kids were a bit younger and were up at 6am ready to go.....we'll see if they have the same motivation as a teenager and pre teen.
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Future Fairy Godmother-A girls gotta dream!
Por favor mantengase alejado de las puertas!!
**do you know how long it took us to learn that?? and then they put it on a t-shirt!! **
I'm used to having a plan for what park we'll be in on any given day. I tend to go by the park hours/touring recommendations from sites like easywdw and Touring Plans. I then make my dinner ADRs based on those plans. So, when it was time to book my FPs, since I already knew what park I was most likely going to be in. Otherwise, I agree, it would've been much more overwhelming.
However, if your plans aren't that set, I would say go ahead and pick the FPs for where you think you will be. You're best bet, if you don't want to be tied to your FPs throughout the day is to try to plan them for earlier in the day so that if your plans do change, you won't be stuck waiting for the pre-booked FPs to expire -- since you can get more once in the parks.
September is a slower month so you should be able to do pretty much everything you want to. The way I plan my FP+ is by knowing what park I am going to on that day(I avoid the morning extra magic hours parks) and then making FP for the busier rides that always have a line that I know I want to ride. For example at MK I made FP for the Mine Train ride and for Peter Pan since those are always busy. And at Epcot I always get one for Soarin and Test Track. And try to make them for as early as possible in the day that way you can always add more later even at other parks. That time of year is a great time to go. Have fun!
The touring plans are all very dependent on the operating hours and are always subject to change.
It's not uncommon for Disney to change the initially posted park hours the closer we get to the actual month, but typically they do beneficial amendments like extending evening park hours, etc. This year, however, Disney did throw a monkey wrench into some of the plans by swapping around EMH days, but I can't recall that this has been a regular occurrence in previous years.
For me, since I already had what park I was going to be in on a certain day and which TS meals we had, it was kind of easy for me to plan the FP. Yes, I did change it a couple of times (mostly the times) but basically I first went with the rides/attractions that I figured would have the longest waits - the mine train, Soarin and Toy Story. Then I added in character M&G because Abby said she wanted them (but she doesn't always want to wait) so Anna and Elsa was first then I got Ariel, Cinderella and Rapunzel, the Character Spot in Epcot and the new Mickey and Minnie M&G in AK. The rest was just a mixture of what were "important" things for us to do. I'm glad I tried it this year because I wasn't going to originally and I enjoyed being able to get on certain attractions at a relatively set time with minimal wait.
OP-I'm so glad you posted this! My day to schedule FP+ is coming soon, and I have really been fretting about it. My main concern is I don't know how much time to allow for anything. Guess I'd better be breaking out my passporter!
I was just going to ask this same question as my day is coming up 9/9 and I will be on a business trip. Where do I get a list of attractions that accept fp+? I want to have the list ready so I can try to punch it in during the lunch break (or maybe during the meeting ssshhh)
The one main thing we do using FP+ is to schedule them in the afternoons and evenings when the lines are the longest. We are there for rope drop and hit all of the main rides like usual. Then late afternoon and evening we use the FP+. As far as PH we get FP+ for the park we are going to in the evening. This works out great especially when we PH to Epcot. We are able to get on rides when the wait times are ridiculous. Be aware...many more attractions are now on FP+. This has caused some rides such as Pirates to become much more backed up than they every were before FP+.
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