The "We Just Can't Skip a Year" PTR/TR 8/9 - 8/15 - Page 5 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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.
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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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Day 2: Magic Kingdom and the start of afternoon naps
We got up today tired from the very full day before but ready to go. We went up front of the resort to get a taxi to the Poly since I was too tired to take a bus to MK then jump on the monorail to get over to the Poly and we had a breakfast ADR at Kona Cafe at 8:35. I didn't think taxi's parked at the values so I went up to the concierge desk to ask them to call one for me. Instead they handed me the phone number for a taxi company. I called and scheduled a pick up and dd & I walked outside to wait for the taxi. That is when I saw another lady ask the people at the luggage desk for a taxi and realized that they do sit at the values they are just over in the parking lot to the right of the main entrance. He wistles over two taxi's and we both each got in our taxi's. My taxi ride from Music to the Poly cost around $18 with tip and it was well worth it to avoid two different types of transportation. We checked in at Kona and were seated in just a few minutes. The restaurant was pretty empty and I commented on that to the waitress and she said the restaurant had been that way since the economy took a turn for the worse. DD ordered the Tonga Toast and I ordered the Big Kahuna. I wished they had a Medium Kahuna because I came no where near finishing but everything was delishious as usual. This is a must do meal for us and we have had breakfast at Kona every trip now. After breakfast we jumped on the monorail and headed over to the Magic Kingdom.
Rides for today included: BTMRR, Buzz Lightyear, Carrosel of Progress (1st time ever), Mickey's Philharmagic, IASW, Jungle Cruise, Swiss Family Tree House, Walt Disney World RR, Mickey's House, Donalds Boat and Pirates of the Caribbean.
When it got hot we headed back to the resort for a swim break. Unfortunately the water in the pools in August is too hot. It wasn't refreshing at all so we headed to the food court for lunch. After eating we headed back to the room and decided a nap in the nicely air conditioned room was a better break than swimming so we closed the curtains and slept for a while. We loved the nap break so much that we did it every afternoon from then on. There is nothing like a good nap while on vacation. It's nice that this was our 6th trip to WDW and we didn't need to tour at a fast pace and could stop and nap.
After our naps we headed back to MK and had dinner at Peco's Bills and rode some rides. We stayed for SpectroMagic as that is our favorite parade. We were by the lady that does silouettes close to Hall of Presidents and were watching her work waiting for the parade and she was so good I had her do a silouette of dd. You get two for less than $9 and I plan to give one of them to my mom. Just as the parade was starting a small group stood where you weren't allowed and the cm asked them to move and the lady said "no". They argued with the cm's (by the end of the argument there were 3 cm's) eventually moving behind where we were standing and then didn't even bother to watch the parade go by. It was an ugly scene and I felt bad for the cm's.
Today was the second day in Florida with no rain - Sunny, Hot & Humid all day.
Next Up: Epcot
Wow, some people! Sorry about your experience at the parade.
When I was a little girl, my mom had someone do a silhouette of me - it's still around somewhere, was hanging on the wall at our house for years. Need to have one done of Madison one of these trips.
I keep hearing wonderful things about Kona - need to get over there. Actually, we've never eaten a meal at any of the Poly restaurants.
Just catching up. Sounds like you're having a great time! Very cool that you got FPs for having TSMM break down on you. Hope you're able to put them to good use later this trip.
Great day at MK. Love the afternoon naps. I love them. I usually can con dH into taking the kids to the pool while I nap in the afternoons. I cannot imagine saying no to a CM who told us to move. Terribly ill mannered as my grandma would say. Looking forward to hearing about Epcot.
How did you like Carousel of Progress? It is one of my favorites. Great update!
My dd & I both liked it. Every trip we try to do something new and we did a few new things this trip. Unfortunately I whimped out on Splash Mountain again.
What a great day! I want one of those silhouettes of DS soon when we go. I saw a cart at DTD that did them too - they were hand cut - is it the same at MK?
Day 3 - Tuesday August 11th Epcot
We didn't set an alarm this morning as we didn't have a specific time we had to be anywhere. I don't sleep late though on vacation as I'm excited to get to the day's activities so I was up by 8:00 am. We took showers and ate some pop tarts in the room for breakfast then headed to the bus stop to hop a bus to Epcot. When we got there it looked like the sea of humanity in front of us as the bag check line was huge. We got thru much faster than I thought we would and were then in line to enter the park. Once in we went straight to SSE which had basically no wait. Note to everyone. When they take your picture for the ride take off your hat. I left mine on and I had a weird cutout in my head in the picture that you create and then are able to email out on a postcard. It looked really funny, although you always look really funny in those postcard. I do love the picture though because the body attached to your head is very very skinny. After SSE we headed to the Land Pavilion to get a fastpass for Soarin. Our time to come back was around 12:15 or 1:15 (I can't remember) so I asked dd if she would mind doing the Behind the Seeds tour with me. It was around 10:15 and the next tour was at 10:30. She said she didn't mind so we signed up with our AAA discount. I haven't gone thru my receipts yet so I'm not 100% sure what the price was but it's the least expensive tour so I know it was cheap. We hung around the area and waited for our tour. Our tour guides name was Mo and she was very nice. I asked her why I kept smelling plants all around WDW that smelled like green peppers but she didn't know. Oh well, that will have to remain a mystery. We got to taste cuccumbers that are grown in the greenhouses during the tour and I have to say that it was the best cuccumber I have ever had in my life. We also got to feed the Talapia which was a nice change since Talapia usually feed us. After the tour we headed into WS and went to the UK and had some fish & chips for lunch. Afterward I headed into France and got a Gran Marnie Orange Slushie. Very good but not really worth almost $9 although I'm not much of a drinker and am not use to spending money on alcahol. I saw Samantha Brown have one once though and really wanted to try it. We then headed back to Soarin for our fastpass. When we were in line close to our turn I asked the cm if there was any way we could be in the top row so we didn't have to watch the screen with feet hanging above us and she told us that we were going to be in the top row. I was very excited. I love Soarin but the feet kinda take something away from it. After Soarin we headed back into WS to get on the boat at International Gateway to go over to DHS to use our fastpasses for TSMM that we got the first day when it broke down with us on it. We headed over, rode TSMM and then headed back to Epcot. We toured WS. It was a little weird because I think it's the first time we didn't do a mask or a passport so there wasn't alot of reason to go into all the countries. We were going to ride Malestrom but the line was too long but we rode Gran Fiesta Tour. We also stopped to watch Off Kilter but it wasn't them. It was a band in kilts but it wasn't Off Kilter. We were disappointed and didn't watch long.
When we were leaving the parks we hopped on the Monorail and rode over to the TTC then over to the resorts. We love touring the monorail resorts and only did the Cont and GF since we were in the Poly the day before. I just love sitting in the lobby of the GF and listening to the piano. Hopefully one day we will get to stay there. We also went over to the observation deck at the Cont to take some pictures of BLT (another place I would love to stay).
Next up: Animal Kingdom and another broken ride
Another great update. Don't think my dd would be as agreeable about the Behind the Seeds tour - too many vegetables! I love me some Grand Marnier Orange Slushie!
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Back! Great start. Sorry TSMM broke down on your first day. And what a first day you had! More please!!
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Pixie Dust
PassPorter Guide Author
Disney Magic - Oct 2015
. After the tour we headed into WS and went to the UK and had some fish & chips for lunch. Afterward I headed into France and got a Gran Marnie Orange Slushie. Very good but not really worth almost $9 although I'm not much of a drinker and am not use to spending money on alcahol. I saw Samantha Brown have one once though and really wanted to try it. We then headed back to Soarin for our fastpass. When we were in line close to our turn I asked the cm if there was any way we could be in the top row so we didn't have to watch the screen with feet hanging above us and she told us that we were going to be in the top row. I was very excited. I love Soarin but the feet kinda take something away from it. After Soarin we headed back into WS to get on the boat at International Gateway to go over to DHS to use our fastpasses for TSMM that we got the first day when it broke down with us on it. We headed over, rode TSMM and then headed back to Epcot. We toured WS. It was a little weird because I think it's the first time we didn't do a mask or a passport so there wasn't alot of reason to go into all the countries. We were going to ride Malestrom but the line was too long but we rode Gran Fiesta Tour. We also stopped to watch Off Kilter but it wasn't them. It was a band in kilts but it wasn't Off Kilter. We were disappointed and didn't watch long. 
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