The trip of many changes... TRIP REPORT UPDATED 4/25 - Page 55 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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!
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Quite a disembarkation process and seems a bit unorganized with the elevator situation and the chaos with the throngs of people! My experience on The Magic is it couldn't of been any smoother as I was off in no time. Just had to wait about ten minutes in line for immigration.
We've had much smoother disembarkation than this. This was definitely the worst experience in recent years - previously I'd have said when we had to get up early to clear customs was the worst, as you had such an early start on your last day. Usually Disney are so much better than this. Sadly not this day.
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That one lady who wouldn't let Mark on needs to be put in her place! Too bad Cabana's menu was a bit limited, but shouldn't be a surprise on the last day.
As we've now disembarked the Wonder, the trip report has come to an end in this forum, but it's certainly not the end of the trip. We're on our way to Disney World and have another six days there, so I hope to see you back in the Walt Disney World trip reports forum.
That definitely did not sound like a magical disembarkment. I hope all goes well getting to the airport as it sounded like a stressful morning with the elevators.
Ok, you've just completely put me off ever doing a Panama canal cruise. Is it usually that bad? I thought the whole "get the foreigners gathered together as if they're second class citizens" (can you tell how much we hated that? ) had gone out with the ark. I only remember doing it on our inaugural cruise in 2004 and it really spoilt things for us, as it was a horrible ending to the cruise, having to be up stupidly early.
You've also put me off buying any liquor during our cruise, although then again at least in September we have an overnight stay in Quebec City, so hopefully that might make things easier if we do decide to get something. I might have to ask how that will work, just in case we see anything we like the look of...
Oh, please don't let this horrible ending make you not take a PC cruise. The rest of the cruise was quite good. As to the liquor, just don't go at the beginning of the time allotted (7-9 for us). After standing in line for about 30 minutes at the start, we gave up and headed to breakfast, then came back. By then, most had been picked up and it went much faster. The poor "lower class cattle call" was slated to start at 6:45 am. I know some stood in line for an hour or so. I don't know how smoothly it ran on the inside, but the ship was cleared by 8:15. Of course, the crew members were having to do it as well, but probably in a different location. They had been assigned times to report, according to our server. If they would do that with the guests as well, it might run a bit smoother. I don't recall ever seeing that on other cruises. Maybe it is only on repositioning voyages. I don't know.
Oh, please don't let this horrible ending make you not take a PC cruise. The rest of the cruise was quite good. As to the liquor, just don't go at the beginning of the time allotted (7-9 for us). After standing in line for about 30 minutes at the start, we gave up and headed to breakfast, then came back. By then, most had been picked up and it went much faster. The poor "lower class cattle call" was slated to start at 6:45 am. I know some stood in line for an hour or so. I don't know how smoothly it ran on the inside, but the ship was cleared by 8:15. Of course, the crew members were having to do it as well, but probably in a different location. They had been assigned times to report, according to our server. If they would do that with the guests as well, it might run a bit smoother. I don't recall ever seeing that on other cruises. Maybe it is only on repositioning voyages. I don't know.
It's definitely something I'd ask before booking any Panama canal cruise. I hope it's not an early start for us foreigners on a repositioning cruise, as that could mean us when we get to NYC on the Transatlantic cruise in September. Ugh.
I was totally surprised that Palo was not up to its usual excellence. But as you said, it was better than the alternative. Not a relaxing way to start your day with that disembarkation.
I was totally surprised that Palo was not up to its usual excellence. But as you said, it was better than the alternative. Not a relaxing way to start your day with that disembarkation.
Monday 15 January – part six: the infamous story of the “Dublin 33”
There was one woman on our tour who happily told us all about the experience they’d had at Dublin. Apparently the ship had left behind people on a Disney tour, which I’ve never heard of before. She said it became infamous on board and the people were known as the “Dublin 33” as there were 33 of them. The tide was going out and the decision was taken to leave. They were apparently repatriated with the ship at 5:00am the next morning.
Now we all said to her on a number of occasions that if they were on a Disney organised excursion, that shouldn’t have happened, but she was adamant. I will say that, since then, I have Googled this, trying to find some confirmation for it, and frankly I can’t, so I’m taking her story with a pinch of salt. It may well be that the “Dublin 33” were on a non-Disney tour, I don’t know, but without some independent confirmation, I’m not 100% sure I believe her. Let’s just say that telling this story as we were frantically heading back to the dock wasn’t exactly reassuring to the rest of the group.
Next: this is almost like an interrogation
I never did read this report and I wanted to try and cram as much as I could today before the boards shut down...I am going out of San Juan in Jan and I knew you would have pictures....and you did not disappoint!
The Dublin 33 is true....I had friends on that cruise. Those people were bused to the next port...and they had no sleep, unless they slept on the bus.
Disney (and most other cruise lines) guarantee they get you back to the ship...but if the ship leaves, then they have to get you to the next port at their expense....which is another good reason to have a passport.
I never did read this report and I wanted to try and cram as much as I could today before the boards shut down...I am going out of San Juan in Jan and I knew you would have pictures....and you did not disappoint!
Glad I could help out!
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The Dublin 33 is true....I had friends on that cruise. Those people were bused to the next port...and they had no sleep, unless they slept on the bus.
Disney (and most other cruise lines) guarantee they get you back to the ship...but if the ship leaves, then they have to get you to the next port at their expense....which is another good reason to have a passport.
I got to finish this up today! So happy the board is still up. You had 2 different ports than we will have but I got a good idea about the Wonder and San Juan. Thanks so much!
I got to finish this up today! So happy the board is still up. You had 2 different ports than we will have but I got a good idea about the Wonder and San Juan. Thanks so much!
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My experience on The Magic is it couldn't of been any smoother as I was off in no time. Just had to wait about ten minutes in line for immigration.
Too bad Cabana's menu was a bit limited, but shouldn't be a surprise on the last day.
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We're on our way to Disney World and have another six days there, so I hope to see you back in 
The poor "lower class cattle call" was slated to start at 6:45 am. I know some stood in line for an hour or so. I don't know how smoothly it ran on the inside, but the ship was cleared by 8:15. Of course, the crew members were having to do it as well, but probably in a different location. They had been assigned times to report, according to our server. If they would do that with the guests as well, it might run a bit smoother. I don't recall ever seeing that on other cruises. Maybe it is only on repositioning voyages. I don't know.
She said it became infamous on board and the people were known as the “Dublin 33” as there were 33 of them. The tide was going out and the decision was taken to leave. They were apparently repatriated with the ship at 5:00am the next morning. 
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