Halloween, Hawaii and holiday celebrations - THIS SECTION COMPLETED 12/27 - Page 3 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Glad you persevered and were able to get the seats you wanted, but sorry you had that stress to begin with. Your room at the Hilton is beautiful, and that sundae at dinner has made me want some ice cream.
Unfortunately, we didn’t have the greatest night’s sleep, and neither of us has any idea why, as we were certainly tired enough. The clock in the room was out by a couple of hours, so I had to check the right time on the computer, which was across the room, and it said 3:30am. Mark was also awake, and although we lay there, we didn’t really get back into a deep sleep again, which was frustrating to say the least. As I say, I have no idea why.
We finally got up at around 6:00am and got going. The facilities here were pretty good, with tea and coffee making facilities, including a kettle (now if only the US had kettles in its rooms! ) so we made a cup of tea, using the teabags I’d packed in the hand luggage. I’d said to Mark earlier that I seemed to be carrying a lot more in our hand luggage than before, and I guess part of that is wising up and thinking about having things like teabags with you, but I think it’s also got something to do with cynicism, and worrying what would happen if the suitcases didn’t show up.
We headed down to breakfast just after 7:00am, getting some photos on the way down…
When we got there, we were shocked to see that breakfast was £18.95 ($29) each Thank goodness it was included in the price of our room, which meant when you take that into account, the room only really cost us £62 ($93). Considering you’re within walking distance of the terminal, I think that’s phenomenal value.
We didn’t get much to eat, as we knew we could eat at the airport lounge later. When the guy who showed us to the table told me that we could get omelettes, I knew what I wanted. I got a cheese, mushroom and tomato one, which was very nice:
It was a bit odd though, as you had to stand there and wait for it to be done, and it was cooked in the kitchen at the back, so you couldn’t see the progress they were making with it. Trying to find somewhere to stand that wasn’t in the way of people getting to the buffet wasn’t exactly easy shall we say.
After we’d finished eating, we headed back to the room, getting a neat shot of all the planes in the air on the way:
That would be us soon!
We headed for the airport just before 8:00am, as we had an airport lounge to get to. On the way, we encountered a family of dumb Brits. We had to wait quite a while for the elevator, and when it came, we punched in level 2 for the terminal. They stood there, asking me to get out of the way, so they could see which level we were going to, which I did. Then when it arrived, they asked if this was the terminal. I wouldn’t mind, but as we had our liquids in a clear bag, it was fairly obvious (I would’ve thought ) that we were heading for the terminal, but apparently not.
We headed inside, amazed at how many people were now heading to Virgin Atlantic to check in and drop off their bags. Of course, the lines were a lot longer now. Obviously they don’t know about twilight check-in, either that or Virgin need to advertise it a bit better to get people to use it.
We went upstairs and headed straight through Premium security, where we barely had any wait, although bearing in mind that nearly everyone else there appeared to be business travellers, I was expecting them to be a bit better organised. When Mark went to grab a tray to put his stuff in, the woman in front of him turned around and said (quite rudely I thought ) “I’ll need at least three of those” and then proceeded to take all the bits out of her hand luggage, take her coat off, and her shoes. We’d already done all of that, so as not to hold anyone else up…
We emptied out into the duty free shop, which is annoying, as you now have no option but to walk through it, and my goodness, the stench of the various perfumes from there I’m usually Ok with them, but at points, I was coughing with them, and I dread to think what it’s like for anyone who’s allergic to perfumes.
Once out of there, we headed upstairs to visit a couple of shops. There’s still building work going on here. One day, we’ll come, and it’ll finally all be done.
We found our way to the No. 1 lounge, although it was a bit difficult to find, as you had to go up some stairs that looked as if they led to a restaurant, but the lounge was up there. It’s a very nice place, as you can see from these photos…
It was pretty packed downstairs, so we headed upstairs, and there was only one other group of people there when we arrived. As the morning wore on, more people did arrive, but downstairs was certainly much busier, so we made the right choice, and I’m glad Mark suggested it. We set up on a table with power points, so that we could log on and use their free Wi-Fi, as there are charges to use it in the rest of the airport.
That would have been a very expensive breakfast, but what a deal you got on that room! It really takes so much of the stress away from dealing with the whole airport scene when you can stay so close to the terminal the night before. The lounge looks very nice, but I'm not sure I like that poor Steiff bear bolted to the wall!
Your hotel looked very nice, and to have breakfast included in your room price was a plus! So far it seems like a nice easy morning, I hope it continues and you get on your flight without a hitch!
Bummer about not sleeping well. I'm naturally not a good sleeper so I can understand how frustrating that can be! At least for that much money, it looks like they offered a pretty decent spread for breakfast.
The lounge looks pretty cool! Glad you found some spots upstairs!
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Sounds like you had a good breakfast and quite a spread they had for it! Hotels are notorious for expensive breakfasts. When I was staying in Paris for two nights before by Eastern France trip, it was 12 Euros for a continental breakfast. That's a bit steep. I just went to a cafe nearby and had coffee, juice and a croissant for about 4 Euros. Much better deal!
Love the lounge at Gatwick and looks so peaceful on the upper level! Did you have any views of the tarmac and the planes taking off/landing?
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That would have been a very expensive breakfast, but what a deal you got on that room! It really takes so much of the stress away from dealing with the whole airport scene when you can stay so close to the terminal the night before. The lounge looks very nice, but I'm not sure I like that poor Steiff bear bolted to the wall!
Sounds like you had a good breakfast and quite a spread they had for it! Hotels are notorious for expensive breakfasts. When I was staying in Paris for two nights before by Eastern France trip, it was 12 Euros for a continental breakfast. That's a bit steep. I just went to a cafe nearby and had coffee, juice and a croissant for about 4 Euros. Much better deal!
I hate to say it, but that's pretty cheap. We've been charged up to €15 for continental breakfast, and as for full breakfasts, they can charge up to €30, which is just appalling.
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Love the lounge at Gatwick and looks so peaceful on the upper level! Did you have any views of the tarmac and the planes taking off/landing?
Most of the views would've been downstairs of that.
What a great lounge. I can see why you wanted to get there and get settled. Gives you that already on vacation feeling before you even get on the flight.
What a great lounge. I can see why you wanted to get there and get settled. Gives you that already on vacation feeling before you even get on the flight.
Great start! Looks like a very nice lounge to wait for your flight. How do those work? Can anyone pay to use them, or do you have to be a member of something?
Great start! Looks like a very nice lounge to wait for your flight. How do those work? Can anyone pay to use them, or do you have to be a member of something?
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That is a huge breakfast buffet, but even then, the price seemed very high, especially for someone like me who prefers a light breakfast unless it's 10:00. The No. 1 Lounge looks very comfortable, and nice that it had free wifi.
Great start Chez! The hotel at the airport looked great, especially when you include the cost of breakfast! And the lounge looks divine! What a way to wait for your plane!
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Mark was also awake, and although we lay there, we didn’t really get back into a deep sleep again, which was frustrating to say the least. As I say, I have no idea why. 
) so we made a cup of tea, using the teabags I’d packed in the hand luggage. I’d said to Mark earlier that I seemed to be carrying a lot more in our hand luggage than before, and I guess part of that is wising up and thinking about having things like teabags with you, but I think it’s also got something to do with cynicism, and worrying what would happen if the suitcases didn’t show up. 
) that we were heading for the terminal, but apparently not. 
Hotels are notorious for expensive breakfasts. When I was staying in Paris for two nights before by Eastern France trip, it was 12 Euros for a continental breakfast. That's a bit steep. 
I just went to a cafe nearby and had coffee, juice and a croissant for about 4 Euros. Much better deal! 
And the lounge looks divine! What a way to wait for your plane! 
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