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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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NO, they didn't offer me any tissues. I almost felt like I was crazy for sobbing the way I was, when they handed me that little certificate of bravery....I really lost it
I totally understand! Sharon can tell you how much I was crying when Lukas got his haircut last time.
Yes, yes......I will get that pixie out and send her your way
FoTLK gives me chills on any normal day, so you can only guess how I was feeling this day.
Make sure you get a Yak Attack with your mom, sounds like you both could use one....or two
Just make sure you give her a bath or something before you send her over. Oh, and I plan on having more than just a Yak Attack this time...I've actually put "drinking money" to the side for this trip. Haven't done that since I was in college.
Oh, and I plan on having more than just a Yak Attack this time...I've actually put "drinking money" to the side for this trip. Haven't done that since I was in college.
I have done the same thing! I have a list of drinks I want to try. I usually do this every year though. Last year I had a $75 budget for my 8 days, and I came home with $50. I had 2 drinks the whole time. Hey at least I had the money if I wanted to have more.
I plan many more this year! INcluding a Yak Attack. 3 years I've been trying for one of those! It will be done...I have a Yak & Yeti ADR.
Between my house computer not working and work being busy (no time for reading ) I finally caught up....all I can say is WOW talk about some magic. From Josie's ride with Alice to all the magic at CMM at the AK...but I think the most best part, the smiles on all of your faces, you all just look so happy, relaxing and just having a great time....a wonderfully perfect trip. Can't wait to read more.
All caught up. I got really far behind and have been playing catch-up. OMG what a fantastic day in AK. I never knew they had a family of the day for CMM - how cool. What an awesome experience. True Disney magic
Between my house computer not working and work being busy (no time for reading ) I finally caught up....all I can say is WOW talk about some magic. From Josie's ride with Alice to all the magic at CMM at the AK...but I think the most best part, the smiles on all of your faces, you all just look so happy, relaxing and just having a great time....a wonderfully perfect trip. Can't wait to read more.
Oh please, I know life is soo busy. I'll be writing this one for a while.
This was a trip we will never forget EVER and never hope to duplicate either, because that could just never be possible.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mommapants
All caught up. I got really far behind and have been playing catch-up. OMG what a fantastic day in AK. I never knew they had a family of the day for CMM - how cool. What an awesome experience. True Disney magic
More please.
I never knew about it either, so I was really surprised for that one. I hope you are feeling OK, I read you had some surgery.
Hope Sandy doesn't get you too bad. We will have to evacuate I'm sure......again
I apologize for the delay in this TR. I felt I needed to take a break from this for a while, I felt the overwhelming amount of magic we were getting was starting to sound annoying. I still feel guilty a little because of ALL the magical things that have happened. I mean some people travel to Disney much more than we do, and never get quite this experience. I am grateful for everything that happened to us, but I don’t want to gloat about it either. Eh, either way, I have to finish this TR because I want to, and also I need to do it quick as I didn’t take any notes.
After some swimming, quick nap for Andre and getting showered and cleaned up we headed down to the lounge to grab a quick bite before heading over to Epcot.
I actually paused for a minute to take a few pics of the lounge. Now, I have nothing to compare this too, but I have to say this lounge was amazing. It was 2 levels of just spacious beauty. The view alone was great. I never once felt crowded in here and the food and drinks were always enough to keep us satisfied. I hope all the other CL lounges are like this…….more on that later though.
A spin on the monorail and we were at Epcot and of course we stopped for some PP pics.
Now at this point we had a decision to make. We had just enough time to maybe squeak in a ride on something, or just casually head to GG and check in a bit early. We choose to ride SE since it was a walk on at the time.
Josie and I rode together and Andre and Arnaud behind us. We had a fun look into our future and Josie actually really got into this ride this time. I was really happy about that too. Of course as we excited though we all had to take a potty break and change Andre’s diaper, so now we really had to haul some but to check in on time for our ADR.
We checked in at exactly 6:40 and were given a pager and told to wait. Josie ran around and played with some other little kids while Andre just followed her around like a monkey. Both Arnaud and I were watching them but checking up on our emails and of course FB. It was really crowded in here tonight and all of a sudden I realized we had been sitting there for almost 30 min. I got up to walk to the front desk and of course my pager goes off.
Carlos was our guy who greeted us and walked us to our table. He was like this awesome grandfather type who loved his job and loved chatting with the kids too. He took his time with us and wished Josie a happy birthday and then explained the dinner to us and filled us in on all the characters we would be seeing.
Soon dinner was being served and characters were coming around. This meal was great, I was worried the food would have been too similar to LTT, but it wasn’t at all. I mean, it was but not totally. I can’t explain it. It was all just really good. I didn’t really care for the atmosphere of this place though. I do think that was because we were on the upper level, the lower level looked to be visually more appealing, but I think tables that have a highchair are always on the upper level. We would do this meal again, but it might not be at the very top of the list.
As we were walking out, Carlos spotted us and yelled; ”Hey Josie, come here someone just called for you” she got all smiles and ran over with him to the phone at the front desk. He handed her the phone and her jaw dropped to the floor. Looks like Goofy was calling to wish her a Happy Birthday!!!! The look on her face was priceless. She gave the phone back and hugged Carlos, then me, then Arnaud, then Andre….next thing you know my whole little family started a big group hug in the middle of the Land Pavilion laughing and hugging, making a total scene and I didn’t care one bit!!! It was truly a really sweet moment!
From there we literally went skipping out of there and headed outside. Josie asked to ride Nemo again and we were all about that.
We took a spin on Nemo, checked out the tanks a little bit and then decided to head back to the Poly and try and make Wishes again from our room.
We had a bit of a wait for a monorail but soon we were back at the TTC and decided to walk back over to our room. Wishes started right as we were getting to the Hawaii building so we sat on the beach and watched from there. Again, another great view and I was happy as could be.
We went up to the room and got the kids in bed. Arnaud ran down to the lounge for some wine for me, beer for him and we just chilled in the room until finally we went to bed too.
UP NEXT: A first BIG ride for Josie…..and almost Andre
Oh, Linny... don't feel guilty whatsoever! I'm pretty sure I speak for a whole lot of Passporters when I say we are thrilled you had such a magical trip... and love hearing all your stories! So glad you came back.
What a special moment at GG. I hear what you're saying though. We ate there once and didn't really dig the atmosphere either. It was okay, but not one of our favs by far.
That lounge looks amazing! I only have AKL to compare it to - and we loved it - but I think this one may have a better spread... and more seating.
Oh, Linny... don't feel guilty whatsoever! I'm pretty sure I speak for a whole lot of Passporters when I say we are thrilled you had such a magical trip... and love hearing all your stories! So glad you came back.
Don't feel guilty, Linny!!! Hearing about all of the magic you had could never get annoying, it couldn't have happened to a sweeter family and I am excited to hear all about it. I'm glad you decided to come back, too
What a cool surprise Carlos had on the phone for Josie, I could see how happy she was about it in the pictures. Great night!
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Don't feel guilty at all. We've had some truly magical trips and the only thing I would say is that sometimes the next time you go back, if it's not as magical, it takes the gloss off a bit, so that would be my concern for you.
I absolutely Josie's face with the Goofy phone call - what a great smile!
No guilt!! It doesn't come across at all that you're gloating. You're just appreciating all the magic and I'm loving it! So glad you captured that phone call from Goofy. What great photos. Josie is a sweetheart to give Carlos a big hug and then her family.
Good luck to you and everyone else in Sandy's path over the next few days!
Don't feel guilty at all. It's not like you were asking the CMs for magic, it just happened. The truth is we are all happy you were able to enjoy these special moments with your family. I think any trip Disney is magical and special enough, even if you don't get extra attention.
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No apologies and no guilt ! I think I speak for everyone when I say we are thrilled that you guys had so much extra magic on your trip and can't wait to hear about more of it.
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I totally understand! Sharon can tell you how much I was crying when Lukas got his haircut last time.
Disney Magic - Oct 2015
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Pixie Dust
I have done the same thing! I have a list of drinks I want to try. I usually do this every year though. Last year I had a $75 budget for my 8 days, and I came home with $50. 
I had 2 drinks the whole time. Hey at least I had the money if I wanted to have more.
"Sparky"(My first trip.)
Holly: 
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Aimee
PassPorter Guide Author
We've had some truly magical trips and the only thing I would say is that sometimes the next time you go back, if it's not as magical, it takes the gloss off a bit, so that would be my concern for you. 
Josie's face with the Goofy phone call - what a great smile! 
! I think I speak for everyone when I say we are thrilled that you guys had so much extra magic on your trip and can't wait to hear about more of it.
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