A 40th celebration to end the world! COMPLETED 6/24 - Page 32 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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You are so right in everything you say. The knowledge does increase the appreciation, plus there's also that little bit of you that goes "I know something most people don't...." - or is that just me?!
Monday 24 December – part twelve: what a stunning place!
Once we were done, we headed back to the room and took a break. We headed out just before 5:00pm to go into the California Adventure for our World of Color dinner at the Carthay Circle restaurant.
I really liked the look of the park at twilight, especially Carthay Circle.
I’ll say something here about the whole look to Buena Vista Street, which was being created the last time we were here. I really wasn’t 100% sure about it from the artists’ impressions I saw, but I do love what they’ve done with it. The Art Deco style is something I adore, so the architecture is a complete winner with me, and it really does take you back to the early 20th century, in a very different way to Main Street USA. However, what I still do not like is the fact that the entrance is still a replica of Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Walt Disney World. I’d much rather they’d done something else with it, as I don’t like carbon copies, and I’m not 100% sure it fits in completely.
We made our way over to the Carthay Circle, and once our names were checked off, we were told to head inside to check in. Oh wow! This place is absolutely stunning inside.
Throughout this are references to the original Carthay Circle…
We settled down to wait to be called for our table, and just enjoyed the atmosphere here. As our server was later to say to us, in here it doesn’t feel like you’re in Disney, and that is so true. You really are transported back to the Hollywood you imagine of the 1920s.
Very soon, we were taken upstairs, and we were immediately taken with the images of Walt, as well as this picture… can’t think why…
The whole place was just beautiful. I walked around and got some photos. It really was designed to make you feel like the star in a Hollywood movie, and that feeling worked perfectly, because I certainly felt very special dining here.
This ceiling replicates scenes from the enchanted forest in Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Why that film? Because the Carthay Circle was where it premiered back on 21 December 1937. Why do I know that date? Because it was prior to my birth date by thirty five years…
We met our server, Holly, who was an absolute star. We talked to her quite a bit, and learnt that she’d toured Europe as a singer at various cathedrals, then she started work at Disneyland in the entertainment section, before moving into food and beverage here. She was an absolute star, and worked very hard for us.
We opted for the Riesling that was listed amongst these wines as having links to the Walt Disney family, but then she discovered that they only had it available by the bottle, rather than the glass. Without trying it, I didn’t want to risk a bottle. She tried a couple of other wines on us, but neither of them did a lot for us. In the end, I spotted a Riesling Spatlese on the menu, and we went for that, but they apparently had to go to the wine cellar to get it for us. We did discuss the option of having it sent back to the room, if we didn’t finish it, but no worries, because we did polish it off!
We were on the World of Color dining package, which Holly told us was either an appetiser and entrée, or an entrée and dessert. We looked at the appetisers, which were pretty much all made for sharing, but there was nothing on the dessert menu that we could easily share, so we decided to both go for entrée and dessert. There was so much good stuff to pick from on this menu that I got Holly’s advice about what she liked. With her advice, I ended up going for the citrus seared Pacific wild swordfish, with relish of roasted red bell pepper, caperberry and orange. As she said to me, it’s not flavours that you think will go together, but that’s what the chef likes to do, pair flavours that you wouldn’t expect, and my goodness they worked.
Mark had the Colorado rack of lamb chop and braised lamb osso bucco, with garlic, rosemary, and root vegetables, and he told me that this was even better than the lamb he’d had had at Palo – high praise indeed!
For dessert, I went for the Cordiella chocolate decadent layer cake, classic dark chocolate layer cake with raspberry sauce. Oh wow, this really was decadent, and I have to be honest, if it hadn’t been for the raspberry sauce and raspberries that came with it, I don’t think I’d have got as far through it as I did, as it was rich, but they beautifully offset that richness.
Mark had the warm enchanted apple upside down cake, with caramel sauce, and green apple sorbet, and he thoroughly enjoyed it.
All in all, it had been a superb meal, and lived up to my expectations, which were already very high, having read very good things about this restaurant from other PassPorters. This is a place we will definitely be coming back to, and I would say that it is far and above any other restaurant in either of Disneyland’s theme parks.
Carthay Circle Restaurant:
Entrée 9½ 10
Dessert 9 9
Service 10 10
Atmosphere 9½ 9½
Value for money 9½ 9
Average score: 9.50
Next: if you want professional photos, then pay for them!
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I kept feeling as though I'd already heard about this restaurant from you, and was starting to get really confused. Then I realized it was from the most recent Passporter!! Relieved that I'm not losing my mind (or at least this wasn't the proof of that!) The restaurant is gorgeous, and it sounds like a top notch meal!
My local winery does this. Thanks for the explanation, I didn't know.
Quote:
Originally Posted by chezp
As a result, I missed a lot of what was said about the restaurant, but I did get the bit about the name. Napa is obvious, but the rose comes from the fact that farmers used to have roses at the entrance to their grape crops, as mildew is a real killer for the crop, and they’d be able to see if there was a problem first by looking at the roses. Apparently though it’s something that’s not really done any longer today.
Your photos are absolutely gorgeous! The twilight pictures are just beautiful! And Carthay Circle - OMG! What a beautiful setting! And your dinner sounded fabulous!
Sounds like a delicious dinner in a gorgeous restaurant! I always forget until I read the title of the next installment...you and Mark certainly packed a lot into Christmas Eve!
I loved all the little fact you learned on the tour. And that restaurant is right up my alley, as I love everything about old Hollywood in the 1920's and 30's. I would have loved to eat there.
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In the end, I spotted a Riesling Spatlese on the menu, and we went for that, but they apparently had to go to the wine cellar to get it for us. We did discuss the option of having it sent back to the room, if we didn’t finish it, but no worries, because we did polish it off! 
yummy!!!
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