Forums Closed
|
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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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!
Best wishes for a wonderful and magical new year!
|
|
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.
|
 |
09-25-2004, 08:51 AM
|
#1
|
Community Rank: Traveler 
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: Frostburg, MD
Posts: 452
|
Indianapolis- is this a good deal? (long and obsessive!)
I'm already starting to work on arrangements for the Star Wars Celebration III convention in Indianapolis in April. We went to Celebration II and had a great time. We absolutely loved Indianapolis along with the convention, so I can't wait to go back!! 
Here's my dilemma- I found a vacation deal on Priceline that almost seems too good to be true. Last time, we stayed downtown in the Omni Severin and the Westin. We paid $120 a night through the Star Wars fan club for the Omni (Friday and Saturday) and I got the Westin on Priceline for $50 a night (Thursday and Sunday), so it was $340 total. We also drove there, it's about an 8 hour drive (one way) for us. I was planning on the same sort of thing this time, but I was browsing on Priceline and found a vacation package deal. Since it's one of their packages, you get to see the hotel and flight info. Here's the scoop:
4 nights in the Courtyard by Marriott downtown AND roundtrip airfare from Pittsburgh for $209 per person! 
The Courtyard by Marriott's website says it's right across the street from the RCA dome (where the convention is being held). But it's only a 2.5 star. The Omni and Westin where we stayed before were 4 star. There is no airport shuttle from the hotel so we'd have to take a cab or maybe get a towncar?
Is anyone familiar with that Courtyard by Marriott? I've never stayed in a Courtyard so I'm not sure how they are. I'm not really concerned with the star level as long as it's clean and nice and has enough room so DH and I aren't tripping over each other trying to get ready in the morning. 
We weren't even considering flying at all until I ran across this deal, but it would be awfully nice to not have that long drive. If we do the deal we'll also have about $30-40 fee to park the vehicle in Pittsburgh for the weekend (we're about 2 hours from the airport and I don't want to bother anyone to drop us off or pick us up). And we'd probably have another $40 at least in cab fare or otherwise to get from the airport to the hotel. So I figure about $500 going the flying route.
Since it's Priceline you can't cancel so I'm obsessing whether to book it or not.  On Monday the 27th Fan Club registration starts so I'll be able to see the prices they are offering for the hotels. But I'm afraid that if I wait too long the Priceline deal will be gone (especially since lots of people may start looking for deals in earnest on Monday). Plus WHY in the world is it so cheap? Could it be that the Courtyard is a dump?
Aaaagggghhhhh, I'm driving myself crazy over this one!!!  I don't want to book it and then be kicking myself later if we hate the hotel. But if I don't book it now and it's gone on Monday then I'll be kicking myself for that. HELP before I lose my mind.  What would you do? 
|
|
|
|
09-25-2004, 02:03 PM
|
#2
|
Community Rank: Explorer 
Join Date: Jun 2004
Location: Southern Indiana
Posts: 9,239
|
Re: Indianapolis- is this a good deal? (long and obsessive!)
I went to the Courtyard Marriot many years ago and it's a clean place. It's just not going to be as fancy as the Westin (of which I've also stayed at). I think I'd compare it to All Stars vs Contemporary. Clean but nothing fancy.
Hope that helps. We live about an hour south of Indy - but I lived in Indy for about 11 years before I moved here. I didn't realize they were having the convention. I wish there was a Star Trek convention coming close my fiance would LOVE that. LOL
Yvonne
|
|
|
|
|
09-27-2004, 09:52 AM
|
#3
|
Community Rank: Traveler
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: Frostburg, MD
Posts: 452
|
Re: Indianapolis- is this a good deal? UPDATE
Thanks so much Yvonne, that did help.  I was worried about the condition of the hotel since the price was so cheap. I talked it over with DH, and he said he doesn't care about staying in the "swanky" hotels, he'd rather take the cheaper place and not have to drive (I think we nearly killed each other somewhere in Ohio last time when we got lost trying to get back on the turnpike ) . He also hated having to move hotels last time, so I went ahead and booked it! I just couldn't pass up those prices. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
*
|
Sponsored links
Check out the many e-books by PassPorter. The e-books are free to download if you have a PassPorter's Club pass.
|
|
09-27-2004, 11:26 AM
|
#4
|
|
Facebook Addict
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Philadelphia
Concierge Level: 6
Posts: 39,682
|
Re: Indianapolis- is this a good deal? UPDATE
Courtyards are great, especially for Business travelers, spacious rooms.
Have you ordered your 4-day passes for SWCelebration3 yet?
They went on sale today.....
|
|
|
|
|
09-27-2004, 12:13 PM
|
#5
|
Community Rank: Traveler
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: Frostburg, MD
Posts: 452
|
Re: Indianapolis- is this a good deal? UPDATE
The C3 website is saying they won't be live until noon pacific time.  I'm in the office today, so at 3pm my time I'll be clicking away! They're offering a Vader antenna topper to fan club members so that will create quite the dilemma for me- Mickey or Vader!!! I'll have to swith on and off with both. |
|
|
|
|
09-27-2004, 10:09 PM
|
#6
|
Community Rank: Traveler
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: Frostburg, MD
Posts: 452
|
Re: Indianapolis- is this a good deal? UPDATE
OMG- I just NOW (it's 10pm) was able to get DH and I registered for the convention. Apparently all the Star Wars fans crashed the server! If I hadn't already booked that hotel I would have been dying!! (Yvonne I owe ya  ) It was bad enough spending all this time getting our admission badges. Well, at least I had something to take my mind off our dwindling vacation counter tonight. |
|
|
|
|
09-28-2004, 11:27 AM
|
#7
|
|
Facebook Addict
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Philadelphia
Concierge Level: 6
Posts: 39,682
|
Re: Indianapolis- is this a good deal? UPDATE
Phew! Congrats!
MTFBWY.....
|
|
|
|
Posting Rules
|
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts
HTML code is Off
|
|
|
|
|
About This Page: 
Like
Thank
Pixie Dust
Linear Mode
