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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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I am a WDW newbie, and have stayed on property each of the two times. In all the reading I have done, I have never seen how what you are "losing" of the Disney experience could me made up with the nomial savings in accommodations...I am looking forward to your description of this.
And...what is the wristlet?
I figured, since we are going to Old Key West in February and most of our weekend was spent at Universal (more on that in my next post), how about saving a few bucks and staying right outside of Universal?? With the package I chose, it was $270 for three nights - a steal, so I thought. Plus, we would have our own car to travel around in. The hotel ROOM itself wasn't bad (again, more to come) but Disney spoils you and my expectations are set so high, it was inevitable that I would be disappointed.
The wristlet is a Disney gift card specially designed with the F&WF logo and at present, only available at the festival. It is reloadable so it can be used for future trips. It's tiny and attached to a stretchy coil that fits around your wrist. Just visit the festival Welcome Center or select merchandise registers and ask for it. We used our Disney Visa (3x points!!) to put $250 for the day. At each kiosk, we placed our order and the cashier just swiped and gave us a reciept, no signing. The reciept is then handed to the food/bev counter and you recieve your items. No fumbling around with cash/change, pulling out your credit card and signing each time. I noticed a TON of people with them.
Only a strong desire to get to our destination kept my foot planted on the gas pedal and the poor Halloween Mickey antenna topper hanging on for dear life!.
Day Two: Islands of Adventure - Harry, here I come!!!
Original plan for today was to get up early and take advantage of the early park admission to IOA included in our package. Unfortunately, due to may to many adult beverages the day/night before, this did not happen. Guess, I'm not as young and resilient as I used to be.
But, I did get up alot earlier than I thought I would. Without a headache too! Must have been all that water I had during my "praying" session. Anyway, we were up and out of the room by 11am.
Oh, wait, go back. The room. Really didn't notice it when we got in the night before (wonder why, hmmm, could've been the fact my eyes were rolling in my head). First thing I did notice upon waking was the lack of a door or front window - it was completely open to the outside. Ok, not really, but that's what it sounded like. Our room was right next to the stairwell - and I mean, right next to it. If you walked out our door and took a large step to the left, you could end up on ground level. So, as EVERYONE passed by our room to reach the stairs, we knew about it. By 9am, hotel staff were powerwashing the sidewalk directly under our room and the mini golf across the parking lot was getting cleaned with a leafblower. Thank the Lord I didn't have a headache!! Besides the noise level, our room was actually quite nice! The furniture was a dark "wood", huge armoire, panel doors to seperate the bath area. Very clean. And the bed?? Hands down, the most comfortable we had ever had the pleasure to sleep on. Really! Complete 180 from the lobby.
Now, back to the parks. We had a 10 minute (if that) drive to Universal. Parking ($15!!) was crowded and moved slowly. If you have never been to US, please note, they don't have huge lots with trams. They have decks (nice in hot or bad weather) and escalators. They also have moving walkways (think Haunted Mansion) to move you along on the 5 to 10 minute walk to the entrance. We usually skip the walkways for just plain old walking since they tend to be crowded and inhabited by lots of smokers. ***FYI, Universal's smoking policy is NOT enforced!!! People were smoking everywhere! Walking around the parks, standing in line, on the patios of restaurants, EVERYWHERE! For a nonsmoker (Scott) and an ex-smoker (myself) it was really annoying.***
Since we had purchased our package online, we could skip the enormous lines for tix and head to the will call kiosks. Swipe the cc, enter ressie # and poof! tix. Twelve in all!!! No Key the World here. One ticket each for our 2day park pass, all you can eat meal deal tix, tix for dinner add on, CityWalk Party Pass, Halloween Horror Nights tix & HHN Express Pass x 2 = 12 tickets! Whew! Finally, time to go thru the turnstiles. Whack! Always get smacked in the butt with the turnstile when going thru.
At last! On our way to Wizarding World of Harry Potter!! I was like a little kid. I was practically pulling Scott along. Let me tell you, I am a HUGE Potter fan and WWoHP did not disappoint visually. Stunning. Walking past the Hogwart's Express and thru Hogsmeade with the rickety "old" shops with snow on the roofs. Even the staff, wearing robes, Gryffindor ties and slouchy hats. I thought, this is how the cast of the movie must have felt. Straight to The Forbidden Journey we went.
The Forbidden Journey is the best. ride. ever. No matter we waited 75 minutes for it, nor the fact I kept having dizzy/nausea spells. I loved it. Better than Soarin'. Part IMAX movie, part rollercoaster, part dark ride. It was awesome. Even the wait line had tons to see. The talking pictures stopped me in my tracks. Not to mention Hogwart's Castle itself. I now know how I must have felt the first time I approached Cinderella's Castle as a small child. Awe.
After that ride, what else was there to do? Dragon Challenge (old Duelling Dragons), that's what. Great ride, but once we disembarked, my stomach and head agreed, that was it for rollercoasters for the day. Scott thought that was a great idea so we headed over to the shops in Hogsmeade. We tried to enter the Owl Post and were stopped by an employee. The entrance to the OP was around the corner. Ok, around the corner we went, to the next door with an employee stationed out front. That was not the entrance either, further around the corner. Ok, further around the corner we went, the the next door. The employee confirmed that, yes, indeed, that was the entrance, but across the way was THE LINE to get INTO the STORE!! What day was it? Black Friday??? An approx, hour line to get into a store. I was aware the stores were small but I was not willing to waste my day waiting in line. We ran into several lines like this. In fact, the only entrance that did not have a line was the men's bathroom. So long WWoHP, we will try back later.
We saw the Posideon's Fury show (great effects, corny dialogue) and decided it was time for some grub. The Meal Deal allows you to eat all day at three different CS spots so we went to Circus McGurkis Cafe Stoopendous in Seuss Landing. Picked up some fried chicken with a small ear of corn and mashed potatoes with gravy and Jello for me and Scott had a hamburger, fries and a lemon cake. I love the corn & potatoes, chicken was a little bland. Scott liked all but the lemon cake.
We just wandered around the park for the rest of the day. Marvel Super Hero Island was cool, wish my tummy felt up to SpiderMan and the Hulk. Jurassic Park Discovery/Welcome center was cool, straight out of the movie. We got to see a 'raptor hatch!! Loved the comic strip area, Betty Boop was strolling around for pics. Scott and I had fun remembering the old strips like Prince Valiant, Hagar the Horrible, Beetle Bailey & Blondie.
We wandered around for a few more hours, had a horrible meal at the Comic Strip Cafe and left the park. We did some window shopping at CityWalk and went to Pat O'Brien's for dinner. Dinner is a $6pp add on when you get the Meal Deal so we went for it. It wasn't worth it. First, we really weren't hungry and second, the food wasn't very good. You get to pick from a limited menu. Scott's Jambalaya was ok. My Muffeletta Sandwich was all bread very little olive spread. We did order some specialty drinks since we were at Pat O'Brien's, home of the Hurricane. Scott got one, I got a Pina Colada. Both were awful!! Tasted like they used very cheap alcohol or all purpose cleaner to make them. We left them untouched. $15 wasted. Oh, and we asked to sit on the patio, forgot you could smoke outside food establishments. That ruined our meal as well.
We drove back to the hotel and grabbed an hour nap before some friends from Tampa came over to party at CityWalk for Scott's bday. We hit up the new Red Coconut Club first. Great time! Very "Rat Pack" atmosphere with all ages dancing to the best live band I've ever heard. I thought they had a dj until we walked around and spotted the band. We'll definitely be back! On to Margaritaville since I had never been. Another live band (although not as good) greeted us and we bellyed up to the Volcano Bar. Unfortunately, the volcano was inactive that night so no margaritas flowing down into the huge blender. The margaritas we order were fantastic none the same. With 2am quickly approaching, we hurried over to the groove for some dancing. Scott's buddy is the manager and we chatted with him a bit upstairs and did some awesome people watching from the balcony. We closed the club like in the old days and dragged ourselves back to the hotel.
The guys decided we needed McDonald's and took a walk. Donna and I got changed and passed out before they got back!! Stinks getting old! At least we got a great night's sleep because the next day was going to be a long one - Universal Studios and Halloween Horror Nights!!!!!
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Thanks for the updates. Great descriptions of the lines. Although we would LOVE to see WWoHP, the lines and the smoking will keep me away longer. Love living vicariously through others to know not only what to do but also what to avoid!
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I've heard and read many things about the lines to get into the stores and how small the stores are in WWoHP. It's just crazy!!! Glad you enjoyed what you did get to see. More please
Great updates! You all made a really dent in the samplings F&WF. Everyone I know has mentioned the huge lines at WWoHP. Glad you enjoyed the roller coasters.
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More please! 
Glad you made it to Islands of Adventure. 
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