The trip of many changes... TRIP REPORT UPDATED 4/25 - Page 14 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Nice photos from the ship and so cool to get some inside Palo, when it's empty! So beautiful coming into Antigua and especially the water. Looking forward to seeing more as you explore the island. My brother and his wife went here on their honeymoon and really enjoyed it.
It is a truly beautiful place and I can see why they enjoyed it. More photos of the island coming up!
Monday 15 January – part two: “25 minutes late, let’s just leave them behind”
Eventually, we tore ourselves away from the view and headed down to the spa. I wanted to enquire about their pamper package that I’d seen advertised in the Navigator last night for $149 and see if they had any availability. I also wanted Mark to try and get some form of treatment that might ease his sinuses, as he was suffering so much.
I easily got the pamper package booked for 9:30am and Mark got in for acupuncture at the same time, which they reckoned would help. I figure try anything – it can’t hurt. He met the woman who’d be doing it and she seemed pretty confident that she could help. Best of all, we’d learnt at the DVC presentation last night that you get 20% off full priced spa treatments on port days. Mine didn’t qualify, as it was a discounted one, but Mark’s did, so that worked.
We headed back to the room to have some down time, although thank goodness we were up, as they decided to take the lifeboat out from underneath us and I nearly jumped out of my seat in shock at the noise and vibration. Ok, so it was past 9:00am, but no sleeping in once that started!
We headed down to Senses Spa arriving, as the girls said, spot on 9:30am for our respective appointments. Mark said when I got back to the room that he felt the acupuncture had really helped him, which is the main thing. As for me? My pamper package was absolute bliss and I really enjoyed it. It was definitely money well spent. For $149, I got a full body massage, facial and an Indian head massage. Bargain!
We chatted away and I learnt that if you work at the spa, you have an eight month contract, as opposed to four or six months elsewhere in the ship. She’d worked on the Wonder over the last two years, because she loves to travel and gets a day off on each cruise. This time it would be Cozumel, last time it was Jamaica. I asked her about eating, as she was telling me you work a 14 hour day with an hour for lunch and an hour for dinner and she told me the crew mess food isn’t good, which really surprised me. I honestly do not know why people choose this life. It is so tough, but I’m glad they do, so people like us can cruise.
After the treatments were done, we both made our way back to the room and I got some photos of the view from there…
After a while back in the room, we headed up to Cabanas for lunch. Their choice for non-meat eaters wasn’t that great. Thank goodness for the peel and eat shrimp is all I can say! To rub my nose in it even more, Mark said there was a vegetarian section. I’d missed the sign, but when I went back, it was positioned over a set of different vegetables. Hardly creative Disney!
My selections Mark’s choice
At least the desserts were good…
We headed back to the room, so I could lather up with sun tan lotion and thank goodness I did, as it was hot outside. We headed out of our room and I couldn’t help but photograph some of the amazingly creative displays on people’s stateroom doors…
I felt really sad that I’d completely forgotten about any decorations for our doors. Memo to self… must remember for our September cruises!
We went down to the Crown and Fin pub…
We were there for our appointed meeting time of 12:45pm, or so we thought…. It turned out later that Disney had apparently put the meeting time back twice more, first to 1:00pm and then to 1:15pm. We were getting quite annoyed, watching people stroll in late and so was someone else evidently, as he yelled “25 minutes late, let’s just leave them behind”. I’d have a lot more respect for Disney if they’d explained there and then about the change in meet time, but they didn’t. Not good.
Seems like they should’ve told you about the time change when you checked in (or earlier).
Glad the acupuncture helped Mark. Some years ago that was the only thing I found that helped with my sciatica.
Glad you both enjoyed the spa treatments and Mark was able to get some relief on his sinuses! Great pictures! Sorry the excursion is off to a rough start!
I'm curious about the acupuncture. Where exactly was she puncturing for sinuses, somewhere on the head, or elsewhere? Very nice that they could do that for him, thank goodness for that spa!
Cute doors on your way to the meeting place! Odd that they didn't tell you about the change in time to meet. They could have made an announcement I suppose.
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Glad you both enjoyed the spa treatments and Mark was able to get some relief on his sinuses! Great pictures! Sorry the excursion is off to a rough start!
Thankfully it got better from there on in - but you're right, it was a very rough start.
Glad the acupuncture helped Mark. Some people really go all out to decorate their doors how neat.
I just loved their creativity. Actually I guess I should use my time off work after my ankle op to think about what we might want to do for our forthcoming cruises...
I'm curious about the acupuncture. Where exactly was she puncturing for sinuses, somewhere on the head, or elsewhere?
I know Mark is reading this trip report, so I'm sure if he has anything to add, then he'll let me know. Let's just say I am a huge baby when it comes to needles (very bad experiences as a child) and I didn't want to know the details, but I'm sure I remember something about around the nose?
Sorry, that's making me queasy just thinking about that. Imagine how well things are going right now - poor old Mark is having to administer nightly injections to me after my op to ward off deep vein thrombosis. I don't know how he's doing it, given how terrible I am with such things!
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Very nice that they could do that for him, thank goodness for that spa!
Cute doors on your way to the meeting place! Odd that they didn't tell you about the change in time to meet. They could have made an announcement I suppose.
They could've done a lot more, I think. I felt Disney handled the whole thing very badly, but more to come on that as this report goes on....
Sorry that your lunch selections was so minimal, I would have thought that Disney would have offered a larger selection for vegetarians! Your spa treatment sounded heavenly Cheryl and that was such a great price too! So glad that the acupuncture helped Mark with his sinus issue. Your excursion sure sounds like it got off to a rocky start. Hopefully it got better with time!
Sorry that your lunch selections was so minimal, I would have thought that Disney would have offered a larger selection for vegetarians!
Me too, given how good they usually are!
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Your spa treatment sounded heavenly Cheryl and that was such a great price too! So glad that the acupuncture helped Mark with his sinus issue. Your excursion sure sounds like it got off to a rocky start. Hopefully it got better with time!
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So beautiful coming into Antigua and especially the water. Looking forward to seeing more as you explore the island. 
To rub my nose in it even more, Mark said there was a vegetarian section. I’d missed the sign, but when I went back, it was positioned over a set of different vegetables. Hardly creative Disney! 
Let's just say I am a huge baby when it comes to needles (very bad experiences as a child) and I didn't want to know the details, but I'm sure I remember something about around the nose? 
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