The quiet litte Trip that snowballed into two PTR - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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I love how you can mark your family's milestones by looking back through your Disney trips.
What is really scary to me is how quickly they change. I look at the picture of Peter in my signature which was taken in July and already he looks different. they really are children for such a short time
Having planned a quiet trip for February I started looking at the price of a 2 day non hopper pass. I was quite shocked at the price per day!. I then thought about getting a ten day non expiration and using the remainder in August, but we would surely want more then 8 nights in August. I even looked at the cost of an annual pass, even with DVC discount I was managing to talk myself out of it until they announced the DVC discount on the premium annual pass. At $399 each it was by far the best offer so i bought these to be used in both February and August.
Rory has been asking me (well actually nagging would be more like it) if we can go back to Universal. I had originally looked at doing 1 day Disney and 1 day Universal but again the cost for 1 day at Universal was high. Then two things happened. I was looking on the Universal site for the cost of a four day pass for my August budget when I discovered that the entry level Universal annual pass is the same price. Secondly my dad gave us a gift of £500. He wants to give his spare money to his children now during his life so he can watch us and his grandchildren enjoy it. So we used his generous gift to buy our Universal annual passes now so they will be available for use in February as well as August.
The quiet little trip I planned for February has now become 8 nights in WDW with annual passes to both Disney and Universal packs. Guess who is probably going to be there for rope drop every day.
Next Up: just a couple of ADr's at our must do restaurants right?
I have learned an important lesson while making my ADR's. Note to self do not read peoples trip reports or look at dining photos while making ADRs.
I started out wanting to redo Sanaa as we didn't really get to enjoy it when we were there in July as the children were over tired (even the teenagers!) and probably a bit dehydrated before we arrived and just as the food arrived Peter (13) announced he was feeling ill. Graeme and i felt fine and were ready to sit for a while and enjoy a bottle of wine with our dinner but it wasn't to be. The best bit is this time if the kids are not feeling it we can say just go back to the room and we will see you later (at least the older ones). Our other dining choices were Chef Mickeys and Kona Cafe.
As we read the boards I first decided that BOG was a must do and I'm glad I added it. We also added Tusker House, Boma and Narcosses purely from reading good reviews or trip reports. Finally we added some lunches as we decided in a departure from our usual we won't go back to the villa for lunch but will eat out. Consequently, we have more ADR's than ever before.
Arrival day: Check in to AKV Kidani: We arrive late and we will be tired and we also have to go to EPCOT to pick up our annual passes and buy TIW. For dinner I am considering either Beaches and Cream or Riverside Mill food court. we will probably decide on the day.
Day 1: Breakfast offsite at the Perkins Pancake place, dinner at via Napoli
Day 2: Breakfast at tusker House, dinner at Sanaa
Day 3; Breakfast in room, lunch at Kona Cafe, dinner at BOG
Day 4: Breakfast at Boma , Dinner at Chef Mickeys
Day 5: Breakfast in Room, lunch QS in Mk or in the Contemporary, Dinner at Ohana
Day 6 Breakfast in room, lunch at Bahama Breeze, dinner at Narcosses
Day 7: breakfast in room, lunch at Margharitaville at Universal, dinner at Smokey bones Offsite
Day 8: Breakfast in room, lunch at the Perkins, Dinner on the airbus home.
I have booked , cancelled rebooked and played with these ADRs for weeks so now it is time to leave them alone and make no more changes. I think they are pretty muich finalised.
I have also gone back and forwards on the dining plan as i do really like the idea of it all being prepaid and not having a food budget to worry about. However, I just can't make it work financially so we will do TIW instead.
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Scottish Hogmanay (with a stolen Picture)
Last edited by Thomhazel; 12-30-2012 at 11:09 AM..
Well I am neither "mice" nor "men" but my best laid plans are going awry for all that. Peter's school has just annouced a compulsary curriculm school trip to Marakesh arriving back on the 15th of February at 10pm. We plan on leaving the morning of the 16th so who knows what we do if his flight is delayed.
After much soul searching we have decided that compulsary or not he is not going. If it is that important to the school they should organise it within termtime. Feel bad but hey ho that is life sometimes.
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