Dreams do come true **Updated 7/24** THREAD 2 *COMPLETE* - Page 12 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Just getting caught up again Cheryl! Glad you enjoyed tea (well, everything except the tea), Twice Charmed, and your dinner at Parrot Cay (we too had a better menu at Parrot Cay than Lumiere's and preferred it )!
Saturday 2 June – part one: you won’t get any money out of us!
It was an early start today, as we were off on out tour of Florence and Pisa. We headed up on deck and discovered how beautiful the port of La Spezia is.
After a quick breakfast, at Topsiders Buffet, we were ready to go, but first we had to make a stop at guest services. Last night when I got back to the room, my key had stopped working, so a new one was needed today. That done, it was off to join the line for the tour at the Walt Disney theatre. This seemed a lot more organised than a couple of days ago when we were last in here and I guess part of that was that we had to tender ashore, which spaced the groups out a bit more.
Soon we were on our way down to take the tender to dry land. It was a pleasant journey over to shore, probably 10 or 15 minutes and those boats fit a lot of people in them. We couldn’t believe how meny they kept loading in.
The Captain waves us off!
When we got to La Spezia, we were greeted by out guide, whose name I forget, but she was very good and did a good job of making sure that we were altogether. We had a couple of minutes to wait before the coaches arrived and then we all piled on board.
Waiting for the bus to arrive
For the next couple of hours, we headed towards Florence with a restrooms top on the way. That was quite funny, as there was a female attendant there, who wanted money from us to use the toilets, but she was to be sadly disappointed. I doubt she got a penny out of any of us, as we all just walked past her, pretending we spoke no Italian (OK, so most people could probably genuinely say that, but I actually knew what her sign said and what she was saying as I walked past her! )
As we drove, there were a couple of quite violent showers and I’m just glad that we weren’t outside during those, otherwise we would’ve been soaked.
Next: not the first sight you expect to see in Florence!
Saturday 2 June – part two: not the first sight you expect to see in Florence!
We saw some beautiful scenery on the way and I can see why so many people say that Tuscany is a beautiful area. It’s dotted with villages on top of the mountains. It makes for some really good photos.
Some of the places we passed (and don’t expect me to match them to individual photos! ) were Carrara, which is world famous for its white marble, Lucca, which dates back to the Roman days, Montecatini Terme, a spa town, Pistoria, with its cathedral and museum and Prato, one of Italy’s most important textile making towns since the 13th century.
You can see olive trees in the forefront of this photo – the light silvery colour Here you can see the gashes in the hills that are made by removing the marble from this area More olive trees
Before we knew it, we were in the outskirts of Florence and what’s one of the first things we see as we drove in? Blockbuster video! That was quite funny.
Soon though, we were in the more historic part of the city and we were dropped off to start our two hour walking tour, as buses are not allowed in the city centre. That’s nice, as it makes the traffic much lighter, although we did have a couple of close calls, including with two fire trucks. Seeing those things trying to get past other vehicles was quite something.
Some of the final sights as we drove into Florence The first sights we saw on our walking tour
[b]Our first glimpse of the Duomo (Cathedral) Carlos, our guide just for the walking tour of Florence
Saturday 2 June – part three: now that’s just mean!
We walked past the Galleria dell’Academia, which is home to Michaelangelo’s David. Fortunately its’ right by the exit and we were told to stand there to see if we could catch a glimpse of it and luckily for me, someone opened the door just after I stopped there and I was able to sneak a shot. Just as well as we weren’t going inside and the lines to get in snaked around the building. We later found out the reason was that today was a republican holiday, which explained why it was so busy.
Look there it is – can you see it!?
All the time, I was watching the Duomo get closer and closer at the end of the road and finally we were there. What an awesome sight that was. The dome was built by Brunelleschi, who did it without scaffolding. Apparently you can see how the inner shell supports the timbers in the outer shell, but there was no way we could get in there, as it was closed to the public because of the holiday.
Nearby is the Bapistry, which was completed in 1359 and was designed by Giotto. The doors of the Bapistry are the most famous section of the building. A competition was held to see who would design them and Ghiberti was chosen. They are described as the gates to paradise and looking at them, you can see why. These are not the original doors though, they are replicas.
We didn’t have nearly enough time in this area and that was my complaint about the first part of the tour. We hurtled through it way too quickly and then at the end, we had about 15 minutes spare, which is what annoyed me. Just five minutes here and then at Ponte Vecchio would’ve been perfect for me and just allowed me to get some shots of us with the Duomo behind us.
We walked down Via dei Calaziouli and what do we see, but the Disney Store! And the question that everyone asked? “Can we go in there?” We were told no in no uncertain terms. Now how mean is that?
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