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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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One of the best ways to adjust to jet lag is not to take a nap when you arrive, no matter how much you want to and adjust to your new time zone. It will make it easier.
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October 6, 2017-Enjoying an amazing dinner at Victoria & Albert's with PP's Dot and Drew
My TR from my most recent trip is now underway. Includes: Universal Studios Florida, Disney World and Sea World Orlando Trifecta TR -Updated December 10th! TR is now COMPLETED!
One of the best ways to adjust to jet lag is not to take a nap when you arrive, no matter how much you want to and adjust to your new time zone. It will make it easier.
How funny - it's definitely different strokes for different people. I avoid doing that, as then it takes my body longer to adjust to the new time zone.
One of the best ways to adjust to jet lag is not to take a nap when you arrive, no matter how much you want to and adjust to your new time zone. It will make it easier.
I've heard other people on here that talk about staying awake until the proper bed time in the new time zone.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cam22
Your plan to fly in stages sounds like it could work for you all.
I'm hoping it will help. I expect that no matter what we do, our bodies are going to be confused for a few days.
I always nap and always manage. I think the key is to nap EARLY in the day and then still go to bed at a normal "bedtime" for your new timezone. If you can't fall asleep later because of your nap, that's when you're in trouble!
Funny, all the opinions on sleep. For me, I do all I can NOT to sleep on the plane. I watch movies, read, listen to music, etc. then regardless of the time we land, I try to make it until at least 9 pm local time before going to bed. With this, I find I'm almost always on the right time zone when I wake up the next morning.
I agree with Cheryl on changing your watch to your arrival city's time as soon as you're onboard the plane.
I also think staying hydrated helps. Drink lots of water on the flight. Planes are dehydrating. Besides, if I need to go to the bathroom frequently, I know I won't be sleeping!
I used to travel for work a lot, and was often going through 10-12 hour time changes.
I always nap and always manage. I think the key is to nap EARLY in the day and then still go to bed at a normal "bedtime" for your new timezone. If you can't fall asleep later because of your nap, that's when you're in trouble!
My napping at home is almost nil because it does effect my sleep at night. If I am extremely tired I will curl up in DHs recliner for a 15-20 power nap but that's it. If fact, a long nap, anything more than 30 minutes, especially an hour or two makes me feel worse than before the nap!
I have tried twice to post on my DL trip and photobucket nor my computer is cooperating. After trying twice, I'm giving up for now and will post here then try later on my Disneyland TR.
I'm of two minds about planning travel. I want to see and do as much as possible but at the same time I do not want to stress myself out. The reason I am talking about this now is because it totally relates to how we planned this trip.
At first I had in a road trip leaving France heading north up Haarlem, (the Netherlands) then across Germany, maybe to Berlin, then south to Munich, Salzberg, then over to DLP. Plus we were trying to fit in both Rome and Venice before Athens. I even pondered Istanbul after Athens. One thing I was really interested in was cruising around the Greek Islands. But alas, this much travel takes time and money. I was trying to fit 4 trips into one, mostly because I keep thinking that this is my only trip to Europe and I might not get to go again so I don't want to miss anything.
At the same time I did not want to spend the night in one place and travel the next, repeat, repeat. All we would end up seeing is trains, planes, buses, and subways. This led to me deciding that we had to stay at least 3 nights wherever we went.
This is why we are staying 4 nights/ 3 full days with partial days on arrival and departure - in Athens.
5 nights/4 full days with partials on arrival and departure days in Paris.
4 nights/3 full days with partials on arrival & departure in Disneyland Paris.
4 nights/3 full days with partials on arrival & departure in New York City.
London is another matter, there was so much to see and do that we were interested in and knowing that a 3 or 4 day visit would just barely wet our appetite - we decided to make London our focus city and really give ourselves time to learn more about it which is why we are there 12 nights/11 full days and 2 partials on arrival & departure days.
Generally our arrival days, besides traveling we find our hotel/apartment etc. check in, unpack, find a grocery store to purchase food - unpack that, make dinner and if we are not too tired take a walk around the neighborhood to become familiar with it.
So, having to be realistic we began to trim until we could fit things into our time frame. Then we began to trim until places fit into our budget. We really pared it down to, I refuse to take these off the itinerary or our must do's. I know I can find things to see and do everyplace I visit and this is a trip with DD in mind and she wants big cities; so this became the fabulous famous cities trip plus DLP. Disneyland Paris, New York City, London, and Paris were the must do's for both of us. Athens is DD's other must do so it has been left in, but I gave up a bunch of World War II places so that we could fit these in which made DD sad.
I told her, I would do another trip later focusing on those either by myself or find another history buff to travel with.
This means that the few history things I'm including DD will not complain since I've taken so many wish list things off our travel list. Even with everything we took off, there is still so much to see and I am full of anticipation.
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One way to do this is write out what you want to do and what cities you wish to visit. Then put in the number of nights you have on your trip. Add up the number of nights you want in these cities, which will most certainly be more than the days on your trip. Then you do process of elimination by subtracting days from certain cities, adding to others and eliminating others as some may not be logistically possible. Just something to think about.
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October 6, 2017-Enjoying an amazing dinner at Victoria & Albert's with PP's Dot and Drew
My TR from my most recent trip is now underway. Includes: Universal Studios Florida, Disney World and Sea World Orlando Trifecta TR -Updated December 10th! TR is now COMPLETED!
Funny, all the opinions on sleep. For me, I do all I can NOT to sleep on the plane. I watch movies, read, listen to music, etc. then regardless of the time we land, I try to make it until at least 9 pm local time before going to bed. With this, I find I'm almost always on the right time zone when I wake up the next morning.
I agree with Cheryl on changing your watch to your arrival city's time as soon as you're onboard the plane.
I also think staying hydrated helps. Drink lots of water on the flight. Planes are dehydrating. Besides, if I need to go to the bathroom frequently, I know I won't be sleeping!
I used to travel for work a lot, and was often going through 10-12 hour time changes.
But we all know that sleep is sooo important. It is hard to really enjoy oneself when sleep deprived. Your way to travel sounds much like mine in that I bring lots to do and especially my water bottle (I hope they have extra water on the plane). It isn't usually a problem staying awake longer, our problem will be the reverse going over - in that my body will think its 3 in the afternoon but the local time will be 11pm. This will make it difficult to sleep when I should.
Quote:
Originally Posted by chezp
I think your itinerary looks great. The first version was definitely ambitious - the sort of thing I'd probably have attempted.
Thanks Cheryl. I could see you going to all those places in one trip
Quote:
Originally Posted by SuperDave
The itinerary is looking good.
One way to do this is write out what you want to do and what cities you wish to visit. Then put in the number of nights you have on your trip. Add up the number of nights you want in these cities, which will most certainly be more than the days on your trip. Then you do process of elimination by subtracting days from certain cities, adding to others and eliminating others as some may not be logistically possible. Just something to think about.
Dave, your plan is basically what we did. Great minds think alike.
One of the most important things I had to figure out was what airlines to take between NYC and London. I read reviews, looked up how wide the seats were, what configuration the seats were in... I'm sure you get the idea. I also compared economy and premium economy. The flight will be 7.5-8 hours which is twice as long as I'm comfortable with. I figured it out budget wise that if I could get the tickets for x amount of money for Premium it would be worth it for the extra space and being able to walk up to the snack/reading area - these things would help me to feel like I wasn't crammed into a tin can with 1,000 other people. I ended up with Virgin Atlantic, and although reviews were mixed for both them and British Airlines - when I had the money and ready to purchase (at the recommended time) Virgin had a much better price; in fact it was just over half of x that I had budgeted for.
This means we have our round trip tickets from New York City to London (Heathrow). Flying over Friday June 30th and returning Wednesday, July 26th. Having these tickets make it seem like the trip is real.
I have reserved a hotel room in NYC for our stopover Thursday night. We have to take the airport train to a place where we can catch the shuttle to the hotel.
I have reserved and paid for the Yotel in Heathrow for Friday June 30th before we fly to Athens.
In Athens, I have reserved an Air bnb, I am hoping everything goes well with this booking the place looked amazing. My Nephew and his wife took their honeymoon to Europe/U.K. and that's all they stayed in were Air bnb's and I stayed at one last summer in Las Vegas so have had only good things so far. We shall see.
October 6, 2017-Enjoying an amazing dinner at Victoria & Albert's with PP's Dot and Drew
My TR from my most recent trip is now underway. Includes: Universal Studios Florida, Disney World and Sea World Orlando Trifecta TR -Updated December 10th! TR is now COMPLETED!
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. Athens is DD's other must do so it has been left in, but I gave up a bunch of World War II places so that we could fit these in which made DD sad.
I'm sure you get the idea. I also compared economy and premium economy. The flight will be 7.5-8 hours which is twice as long as I'm comfortable with. I figured it out budget wise that if I could get the tickets for x amount of money for Premium it would be worth it for the extra space and being able to walk up to the snack/reading area - these things would help me to feel like I wasn't crammed into a tin can with 1,000 other people.
I ended up with Virgin Atlantic, and although reviews were mixed for both them and British Airlines - when I had the money and ready to purchase (at the recommended time) Virgin had a much better price; in fact it was just over half of x that I had budgeted for.
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