A DREAM is a wish your heart makes – a First-time Cruise pre-trip report complete On the cruise ! - Page 15 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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!
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.
We just came back from a Disney Cruise in the Mediterranean (July 25 to August 6, Spain, France, Italy, Croatia, Malta). The trip itself was awesome (food, entertainment, service, excursions, etc.) but we hade the nasty visit of bed bugs. I got more than 100 bites; my wife nearly a hundred. The first day I got a few (in the middle of the cruise) I thought they may have been mosquito bites while onshore. The second day I got dozens of bites. I got an allergic reaction too. When I reported the incident the staff did find bedbugs. They did on the same day change us to a better room and offered medical treatment. However, their only compensation was 150 US$ per person. After we moved to the new room no one ever asked us how we were doing.
The room next to ours had also bed bugs. The people there were also moved.
That's terrible you had bed bugs. Sorry you had to experience that.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iwonathomas
You will so enjoy cruising! I have been on like 10 cruises and have loved everyone of them. I do suggest taking Draminine as soon as you get on the boat and then you should be fine when it starts moving.
I agree with just getting off the ship at Nassau and walking around on your own and then gettting back on and enjoying an empty ship.
Thanks for the advice! I will be taking Dramamine for sure!
Thanks everyone for all the birthday wishes, checking on my Dad and seeing about Dylan's first day of school!
Dad has had two treatments and so far so good! Saw him today and he looked the same and acted fine too.
Dylan's first 2 days of school were a success! His teacher called Friday afternoon to say he was doing "fantastic" and was a "real leader". Now why can't he be as good at home as he is at school?!
Weekend was full of themed dinner and more birthday stuff. Pictures later (for those on on FB).
I'm happy to hear you're Dad is doing good.
That's the age old parent's dilemma... sweet as pie when you take us out... aggravating as can be when you get us home!
Registered Message Board Members Get Our Free Newsletter! When you register you'll have the option to sign up for our weekly PassPorter Newsletter. It's chock-full of feature articles; news; tips; contests; photos; and special offers in our online store.
Congrats to Dylan on first day of school. Knew he would do great. evan was fine his first day but cried when I left the day of his Halloween party - go figure!
Catching up here...
I love the themed group idea for Halloween and how cool to trick-or-treat on the boat!!
I was trying to think of costumes with 2 boys (you need to grab one more boy and I can send you our Daisy, Donald, Huey, Dewey and Louie costumes ) How about something obscure Disney...Hercules, Megara, Pain and Panic? Not sure how, but just putting it out there.
Love the zoo pics of the boys and the shark week shirt. And how cute is that baby elephant??
So glad Dylan is rocking kindergarten
And also some belated for your dad. Glad the first two treatments went well.
Oh my first day of kindergarten. Can't believe how fast time goes when kids are little. Glad to hear your dad is doing ok and I hope it continues to go smoothly for him. Happy (late) Birthday!
Glad things are going well with your dad and for Dylan at school.
Thanks Cheryl!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kenny
I'm happy to hear you're Dad is doing good.
That's the age old parent's dilemma... sweet as pie when you take us out... aggravating as can be when you get us home!
Oh I know he can be! Mom hasn't said anything so I assume all is normal. He's still working and they're going to the baseball game Thursday so everything is going ok.
Quote:
Originally Posted by lauriep
Glad to hear your Dad is doing well! , Dylan!! It's very nice that the teacher went out of her way to communicate that to you.
It was nice! I wasn't expecting that and definitely don't think it's a norm after telling some others about it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by KMB733
Glad to hear things are going well with your dad and that Dylan is off to a good start at school!
Thank you!
Quote:
Originally Posted by mommapants
Happy Birthday.
Congrats to Dylan on first day of school. Knew he would do great. evan was fine his first day but cried when I left the day of his Halloween party - go figure!
Aw! I'm still glad Mike drops him (and Lukas) off every day!
Quote:
Originally Posted by dsteiny23
Catching up here...
I love the themed group idea for Halloween and how cool to trick-or-treat on the boat!!
I was trying to think of costumes with 2 boys (you need to grab one more boy and I can send you our Daisy, Donald, Huey, Dewey and Louie costumes ) How about something obscure Disney...Hercules, Megara, Pain and Panic? Not sure how, but just putting it out there.
Love the zoo pics of the boys and the shark week shirt. And how cute is that baby elephant??
So glad Dylan is rocking kindergarten
And also some belated for your dad. Glad the first two treatments went well.
Thanks Dawn! You'll see my plan in the next post for Halloween. But that is a good idea!
Quote:
Originally Posted by stardust190
Oh my first day of kindergarten. Can't believe how fast time goes when kids are little. Glad to hear your dad is doing ok and I hope it continues to go smoothly for him. Happy (late) Birthday!
First things first: themed dinner and a movie night! Last Friday the movie was Peter Pan and we had Neverland Sandwiches (peanut butter & marshmallow fluff), Pirate’s Booty (cheddar popcorn), Fruit Swords, Pixie Punch (sparkling cherry limeade), and Sunken Treasure (brownies with Reese’s peanut butter cups & pieces with graham crackers as the sand).
Saturday was Mike’s birthday and fittingly we went to an international soccer match that was held here at home. Even though the team Mike was rooting for lost we still had a great time watching Real Madrid and Inter Milan. This was also Dylan’s first professional soccer game (Lukas stayed home with my Mom).
I asked on FB about costumes and everyone had great ideas (lots of PP peeps too) – Beauty & the Beast with Lumiere & Cogsworth (which was my brothers idea and would have been awesome!), Wreck-it Ralph characters, etc. I compiled a list and asked the boys their opinion. Lukas wants to be Hulk and Dylan wants to be a Ninja Turtle. I’ve convinced myself Star Wars would be best as we already have everything we need for them so now it’s on to convincing the little boys. I’m sure I’ll figure something out.
I did receive some good news today. Our waitlist for BLT came through! We’re staying there for the 2 nights after the cruise. I am looking forward to just walking back to the resort instead of waiting in line for a bus. For those that have stayed there – how long is that walk? Because I’m debating on whether or not to bring a stroller with us or just rent when we need it.
2 months from right now we'll be sailing on the Dream!!!
Another awesome theme dinner! Congrats on getting BLT. I think you'll want the stroller for the walk back, especially if the boys are tired. The walk takes about 10-15 mins. I'd say it's a tad longer than the walk from BW to Epcot, but shorter than the walk from BW to the Studios. It's so great at night not to have to wait with the mobs for a bus or monorail. Just to save walking, it might be a good idea to take the monorail to get to MK and then walk home.
About This Page: 
"Sparky"(My first trip.)
Like
Thank
Pixie Dust
Disney Magic - Oct 2015
Now why can't he be as good at home as he is at school?!
PassPorter Guide Author
Holly: 
I'm still glad Mike drops him (and Lukas) off every day!
Linear Mode
