Oh the Places We Go, The People We See Updated 11/03/2013 - Page 53 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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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.
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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 believe I actually slept in a little longer today than 6 AM. I guess I was getting worn down. I showered and got ready for the day and let Claire sleep. I think a bomb could’ve gone off in the room and she would’ve slept through it.
Since we had a poolside room, I decided to go out around 7:15 and take a few pictures of the area while Claire slept.
I had to take a peak in the laundry room.
After about 15-20 minutes of walking around the pool I went back into the room and finished getting ready. It was then time to wake sleeping beauty. Slowly but surely she did get up and ready to start another big day.
We then made our way to the bus stop.
While waiting for the bus, the lady behind me asked if I was on the Nov. facebook group. I told her no….wait…yes I am. LOL! I don’t know what I was thinking when I said no. She told me her name, Jennifer, and I recognized it and we chatted a bit. She had recognized Claire’s top as I had posted it on the group back when I got it. I hadn’t been too active on it for a month or so prior to the trip though. I was busy writing my TR from the Sept cruise and honestly there were a couple of annoying people on there. Carey was on it was well and she can verify that we had a couple of whackos posting daily……like 70 times a day and with really dumb questions. Some people were changing ADRS EVERY SINGLE DAY, and adding in more just to have a snack and paying out of pocket to basically try as many restaurants as possible. And then there were other issues there too. And eventually there was a “fake” poster caught. Not sure what that was about ….why on earth would you make a fake name and pretend to be going to Disney? Anyways, bus mojo was not with us this morning either. We had to wait quite a while for a AK bus to arrive. And we kept seeing buses that didn’t have park names on them. I think they were testing routes or drivers. Eventually I do believe we got on one of those buses because the wait was so long they directed one to take us over there.
We eventually made it over to AK.
We stopped for a few photopass pictures before we went in.
And I was sooooo excited to get this picture. It has been on my bucket list for quite some time.
We then headed towards the entrance with a few pictures on the way.
Once we got into the park we stopped for another photopass picture.
And on we went again.
I think you have a pretty good idea where we were heading.
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The standby line wasn’t too long either and moved fairly fast.
Soon it was our turn. I forgot to change the settings on the camera and took this picture. It was very weird looking and over exposed. But as I darkened it a bit it came out kind of neat looking.
We had another fun and exciting ride.
We had a late breakfast ADR at Tusker house today, so we slowly made our way back over in that direction.
We did a little bit of browsing.
The line to check into Tusker House was SUPER long. It was unreal. So a little after 10 we got in line for our 10:30 ADR.
It took quite a while to get through. They had a couple people checking people in, but they seemed clueless. Let’s just say this process annoyed me so much that I doubt I’ll ever go back there. Once we got checked in they told me to go back and wait for Donald. I told them I didn’t want to wait for Donald, we just wanted to eat, so they told me to take my ticket inside and give it to someone.
So that is what I did. Only the people inside told me I wasn’t called yet, I had to see Donald first to get another ticket. I don’t want to see Donald, we want to eat. By the Way Donald’s line was at least another 20 minute wait. We weren’t going to get the picture, so I wasn’t wasting the time and Claire didn’t want to wait in it either. Finally someone points me to a podium and tells me to check with them. So I go there and tell them I am supposed to hand my ticket in so we can be on the list to be seated. They tell me, you need to see Donald first. UGH! I don’t want to see FREAKING Donald….we want to eat! This guy was confused too but finally was able to make a ticket switch and get us on the list to get called in. Once that happened, it wasn’t too long. And as we went in, I saw the people who were in front of me in the original check in line….STILL in line for Donald and they had a ways to go.
We were taken to the back room.
We quickly went up to get some food as it was going to be a few minutes before any characters made their way to us.
We went for pretty normal items. The African food just wasn’t our thing and the few things I did end up trying I did not care for.
A little bit of dancing around.
And then Daisy made her way to our table.
Mickey wasn’t too far behind.
We went up to the buffet a couple of times, but for us, we really weren’t impressed with the selection. Like I said, the African selections just weren’t something we cared for, so we were sticking to the basics and that limited us a bit. We were ready to go and had paid, and I let the waitress know that we still hadn’t seen Goofy, but we wanted to leave and wondered if there would be a way to see him shortly and she said yes. She pointed out a Cast Member and told me to talk to him, so I did. He told me where to stand and that he would direct Goofy over to us. Within a few minutes we got to visit with Goofy as well.
With that meet and greet done, we grabbed our things and headed out. I did take a few pictures before we left.
I think you know my thoughts on Tusker House by now. It was way too much of a hassle to actually get checked in and seated. The food was good, but not enough variety for us who don’t want to get crazy with the African food. And the price is just too high to go for just the basics. I will really have to think long and hard before going back again….and if I do, it will be an early ADR, which will hopefully eliminate the long check in wait.
Sorry about the long check in for TH! I know you were probably so annoyed at the time, but the story about everyone wanting you to go see Donald is pretty funny now We enjoyed our breakfast at TH, but I agree with you, if you're not into the different African dishes it's probably not the best choice.
I've never been to TH since it changed to character meals. I know I'd hate the confusion and long waits to check in. That does NOT sound like fun, especially when the food wasn't to your liking once you got in. I think probably I'd love the food, though, since I understand it's similar to the food at Boma. I love the African dishes.
We had a similar situation at our lunch ADR at Tusker House on my recent trip. I was so confused by the check-in process and having to go to several stations, and we didn't want to see Donald either. The CMs were not clear on what we should do at all.
Sorry you had a bad check-in at TH. It can be a little crowded in the lines but ususally goes pretty quick. TH is my favorite character meal, but I guess if you're not into the African items it may not be worth it.
Sorry about the long check in for TH! I know you were probably so annoyed at the time, but the story about everyone wanting you to go see Donald is pretty funny now We enjoyed our breakfast at TH, but I agree with you, if you're not into the different African dishes it's probably not the best choice.
It is kind of comical.....and actually Claire was laughing each time they would direct us to Donald.
Quote:
Originally Posted by lauriep
I've never been to TH since it changed to character meals. I know I'd hate the confusion and long waits to check in. That does NOT sound like fun, especially when the food wasn't to your liking once you got in. I think probably I'd love the food, though, since I understand it's similar to the food at Boma. I love the African dishes.
Yes, it is similar to Boma. I enjoyed Boma, but again I ate mainly the plain stuff. I am not sure I would rush back there either because of that. But i am glad I have now tried both places.
And we certainly didn't starve at all. These just were not big hits with us.
Quote:
Originally Posted by chezp
Sorry about the long wait to get into Tusker House - I've never experienced anything that bad in our visits there.
I hear some people breeze right through and others have similar situations to mine.
Quote:
Originally Posted by pamcarey
We had a similar situation at our lunch ADR at Tusker House on my recent trip. I was so confused by the check-in process and having to go to several stations, and we didn't want to see Donald either. The CMs were not clear on what we should do at all.
It's funny how they don't know what to do if you want to skip Donald.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OhToodles!
Sorry you had a bad check-in at TH. It can be a little crowded in the lines but ususally goes pretty quick. TH is my favorite character meal, but I guess if you're not into the African items it may not be worth it.
I was hoping the line would go qucik but sadly that wasn't the case this day. Everyone seemed so confused about everything.
When we exited Tusker House we took a few pictures out back before heading off.
We had picked up fastpasses for the safari before heading into Tusker House and the time to use them had arrived.
It wasn’t long and we were boarded in our truck.
We saw lots of animals out and about, but I had major issues with pictures. The people in front of me pretty much were in my view at all times. I don’t know if I had a bad angle or what, but I constantly had an arm, elbow, head, camera lens,….you name it…it was in my shot. I have tried to crop most of my pictures to get them out of the shots as much as possible, but at times I just couldn’t get them all out.
It looks like the birds are hungry for some Hippo …..
Seriously? Why are all these birds here?
We saw a lot of giraffes again on this trip.
Stretch just a little bit further and you’ll reach it.
I think he got a neck cramp.
This would’ve been a better shot, but I had to crop out a lot of the picture.
This guy is kind of camouflaged. It’s hard to see his head looking over the top of the branch. I thought it was pretty cool though.
Of course it’s not a safari without a little bit of giraffe butt.
Ah the elephants. I could’ve gotten some great shots of them…..if I didn’t have people in the row in front of me!
I had taken one right before this next one that would’ve been AWESOME…except the picture has major blockage and came out with a big blur in the middle of it. That blur would be my traveling companion’s camera lens.
How cute is this? They were pushing the baby up.
2 little guys playing.
Another shot that could’ve been awesome….but you can see even with cropping I couldn’t get all of the other person out of it.
The Lioness. This picture actually isn’t too bad looking. If you saw the original you would be amazed I got this. I had Claire’s head and my neighbors head in about 2/3’s of the picture and I cropped it way down and hoped it would be something worth saving, and it actually looks decent.
The ostriches had to check out the truck.
Just lazing around….taking a rest.
What you looking at?
After the safari we ran into a photopass photographer on the exit out. We stopped and got a few fun shots.
We are supposed to be pointing and looking at a wild animal in the distance. Do we look convincing?