Adults only – sampling southern England COMPLETED - Page 38 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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.
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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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Your time in the pool area sounded nice. Surprised there weren't more people there though!
Dinner looked delicious! I'm glad it tasted just as good too. But what's with the service? That's a bit of a shame they can't seem to get the two to match up.
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Dinner looked, and sounded, spectacular! It just seems so odd that a resort of that caliber has such sub-par service. It's like they dropped in staff from a 1 star resort into a 4 star, with no training. Just shaking my head.....
Your time in the pool area sounded nice. Surprised there weren't more people there though!
Dinner looked delicious! I'm glad it tasted just as good too. But what's with the service? That's a bit of a shame they can't seem to get the two to match up.
I know. I did wonder if it was because you don't tip, because it's kind of all included? Let's just say we certainly didn't tip, not after the service we had...
Dinner looked, and sounded, spectacular! It just seems so odd that a resort of that caliber has such sub-par service. It's like they dropped in staff from a 1 star resort into a 4 star, with no training. Just shaking my head.....
You're certainly spot on that they didn't have four star service to go with the food....
What a great meal at Oliver's! It all looked so good. The presentation was amazing and I want some of your Sea Bass! What a deal you got on the meal!
Loved how Mark looked with the price tag!
I can't believe a restaurant of this caliber doesn't have better service, which is lacking for the quality of food you seem to be getting! I think they need to take a few lessons from Disney on what good customer service actually is!
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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!
What a great meal at Oliver's! It all looked so good. The presentation was amazing and I want some of your Sea Bass! What a deal you got on the meal!
Loved how Mark looked with the price tag!
I know - it's classic, isn't it?
Quote:
I can't believe a restaurant of this caliber doesn't have better service, which is lacking for the quality of food you seem to be getting! I think they need to take a few lessons from Disney on what good customer service actually is!
I think a lot of places could do with learning lessons from Disney when it comes to customer service.
Just catching up the last 2 updates. The Chinese room really looked relaxing. Sometimes downtime is a great thing on a trip. All the beautiful photos you took of the elegant dinner were very enticing. I have to say it just does not look like much food, but I'm guessing with appetizer, main dish and then dessert it would be filling.
Just catching up the last 2 updates. The Chinese room really looked relaxing. Sometimes downtime is a great thing on a trip. All the beautiful photos you took of the elegant dinner were very enticing. I have to say it just does not look like much food, but I'm guessing with appetizer, main dish and then dessert it would be filling.
It was one of those meals where you felt just comfortably full when you were done with eating.
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Friday 9 May – part one: are we ever going to find somewhere to park?
I woke up at 6:40am, but that was fine, as we were in bed not much after 9:00pm last night, so I felt as if I’d had a good night’s sleep, plus breakfast was earlier this morning – from 8:00am until 9:30am, as check-out is 10:00am, which makes sense.
I took a load of stuff back to the car, as the room was even hotter than it had been during the rest of our stay and I needed some fresh air. On the second run down as we headed to breakfast, it was raining. I think it’s going to be another of those days…
We stopped off at the shop, where I got some chocolate for work (it’s a tradition that anyone who goes on holiday always brings back goodies when they return) and some small Christmas presents for the family that I’d spotted earlier in the week – tea towels with witty comments on.
Then we headed in for breakfast. My goodness, our server was really on fine form today – and by that, I don’t mean it in a complimentary way! I had to go up and ask him for my eggs benedict, as he was just standing there, looking very bored. Glad to see you’re keeping yourself busy – not….!
We had our fill of breakfast goodies for the last time and sadly said our goodbyes to Barbara and Majorie. I’d really enjoyed both their company over the last four nights, and I was said to be saying farewell to them.
We then headed back to the room and finish up the last of our packing, then we headed out about 9:45am. I had to go to reception to drop off our key – how I miss Disney’s express checkout at places that don’t do the same thing.
We made our way back on to the motorway, and headed for Bath. The GPS wanted to take us off the motorway a junction later than we did, as we knew there was a major event, the Badminton Horse Trials, taking place at that junction, and we didn’t want to get caught up in any traffic for that.
We went through some beautiful picture-postcard villages on the way over to Bath…
… with some lovely views of the surrounding countryside…
Soon we were entering Bath…
… and then we crawled along in traffic. It gave me a good opportunity to get some shots of the beautiful properties this city is known for…
However, to be blunt, the traffic was just plain crazy. I think the GPS had us down as arriving at 10:50am, and that just kept going back, and going back, and going back. I think we finally parked up in the end at 11:10am. This was all just covering literally the last two or three miles. It didn’t help that the GPS was determined to send us down a road that’s pedestrianized. Finally, we decided to just pull into a car park that did long stay car parking, as we knew we’d be some time here, and we’d walk from there.
It was a nice car park…
… and very central to the shops – this is the view that greeted us as we emerged, one of the UK’s big department stores.
It was a bit freaky to walk around the corner and find this…
I think it was part of the Bath in Fashion Festival, which seemed to be taking place all week long. We saw a make-up demonstration, at least that’s what it looked like from outside, taking place in a marquee right outside the Roman Baths, which was a bit surreal to say the least!
We soon found the Roman Baths. They were built in the first century, and this complex is an amazing testament to the Romans. It also includes a temple dedicated to the goddess Sulis Minerva, combining the Celtic goddess Sulis and the Roman goddess Minerva. The open-air bath was discovered in the 1870s and, leading off from it, are various bathing chambers. We visited it before with Sue and Steve on their 2008 visit over here (post 200).
… and right next door is Bath Abbey. The legend is that God dictated the design of this abbey to Bishop Oliver King in a dream, who promptly began work on it in 1499, rebuilding the existing church, which was first founded in the 8th century.
We carried on walking past the Abbey and found some curious things…
Next: “that would be what would happen if you fell in…”
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I did wonder if it was because you don't tip, because it's kind of all included? Let's just say we certainly didn't tip, not after the service we had...
It all looked so good. The presentation was amazing and I want some of your Sea Bass! 
What a deal you got on the meal! 
I think they need to take a few lessons from Disney on what good customer service actually is! 
Too bad the servers here are a drawback.
I had to go up and ask him for my eggs benedict, as he was just standing there, looking very bored. Glad to see you’re keeping yourself busy – not….! 
This was all just covering literally the last two or three miles. It didn’t help that the GPS was determined to send us down a road that’s pedestrianized. Finally, we decided to just pull into a car park that did long stay car parking, as we knew we’d be some time here, and we’d walk from there. 
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