Cindybelle's Bella Notte TR COMPLETE!! - UPDATED 10/19 With Prices! - Page 10 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Yes, Ma'am. How about some exterior shots we took from the top of the Cathedral a few days later?
From the same tour, we got a nice vantage point INSIDE the Duomo. This perspective helps you understand the ENORMITY of this structure -- the people look like ants, don't they? And we aren't nearly at the top of the structure!
Wonderful - we never got to go inside, which was such a shame.
Cheryl, that makes me feel better -- because we never went inside the Duomo Museum or the Baptistery. The cathedral is fairly unadorned (at least, compared to other cathedrals we've been in), and apparently most of its art work is on display in the basement museum. We went down there twice to buy things at the gift shop, and it seemed so stuffy down there that I said, "Let's not go to the museum." Now that I'm home, reading about all the goodies they have in there, I've been kicking myself.
You can't see it all, no matter what you do. We saw plenty of gorgeous stuff in all the cities we visited, so I'll let myself off the hook now! Thanks!
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Ok, I absolutely loved, loved, loved the picture of you with the straws. HIGH-larious! It's a big selling point that you are such a cheap date. I know of a great t-shirt company. Maybe we'll get you customized t-shirt that says, "Cheap Date. It'll only take one sangria". I must say the same factor was a point in favor of my boyfriend. He is not a drinker at all either.
Another picture that I loved was the exterior of the cathedral at the top and the picture of the interior of the cathedral in which the people are so tiny. It just takes your breath away.
Even before your trip report, Italy has been at the top of my list of places to visit. I think I'm going to have to work something out with Craig. He wants to see Paris (which I've visited) and I want to see Rome (I'm even more of a history nut than an art aficionado - and he's been there). So something tells me we might have a trip with a week in Paris and a week in Rome. But that is so far down the pike it ain't even funny.
What a great deal you got for the B+B! Gotta love it!
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i think douglas wants to join us on the next cindy-guided tour of italy!......
Sheri, I agree -- especially since he finds me HIGH-larious (at least after I've had a Sangria at 2:00 in the afternoon ). Douglas sounds like a lot of fun. We'll definitely include him in our Disney Dream Trip to Italia! Hmm, maybe we start calling it DDTTI -- is it too late to get this included in the 2010 PassPorter's Guide?
Everything sounds amazing, from the pictures to your descriptions. Just reading you can tell what an amazing trip this was for all of you. Can't wait to see more of Florence, I love the look of the B&B, so perfectly quaint and what a good dreal.