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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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It's been almost a year, so here is the trip report! This trip to Disney World was to celebrate our DD's Sweet 16. This was our second Sweet 16 in WDW! We stayed at AKL Kidani Village and I have to say it was one of our favorite resorts yet! We had a Savannah view room and it was amazing. It was great to have a kitchen this time around. We ordered food from Garden Grocer and it was waiting with bell services when we got there.
Those on the trip were Me, DH, DD (15 about to turn 16!) and DS 9. This was our first trip without our oldest daughter who was 21 at the time. I was sad to leave her, but she had work and couldn't get off because of many reasons. She took it well and has since then started planning her own trip with friends.
Day 1 - When we arrived the coolest thing was that the nice lady waiting on the sidewalk with a clip board knew our familys name before we reached her. Our magic bands had been read and she was ready for us. Too bad our room was not ready. It was not ready at check in so we walked around the resorts pool and then had something to eat. We dragged our carry ons with us, because we wanted them with us as soon as we went up to our room. The room was ready after nearly 2 hours. Not fun, but when we got up there we forgot about the wait. Bell services showed up pretty quickly with our luggage and the food from Garden Grocer. Very nice! The young man who brought it up was extremely pleasant.
On our arrival day, we stayed at the resort. There were some activities going on so we went to see what was happening. The kids got to roast marshmallows and make S'mores. They enjoyed that very much. Then we went back to our room and sat on the balcony to watch the animals.
Day 2 - We visited Animal Kingdom on our first day. The first thing we did was ride through the safari. Then we headed over to Tusker House for our breakfast reservation. It was super hot out and we did have to wait outside for quite a while. We normally don't travel to WDW in the summer, but since it was for a special occasion we did it. I know that Tusker House gets a lot of compliments, but we didn't love it. The food on the buffet was dry, the eggs were runny, when you would get to a station it would be empty. My DH hated it. I wouldn't go that far, but I wont go back again.
We took the kids to Mt Everest Adventure and they rode alone, because DH and I didn't feel like riding it. Then we went to Dino Land and played some games and the kids went on some rides. At that time, it was crazy hot so we headed back to the resort. We napped and swam in the pool and relaxed for a while. Later we headed over to DTD which is now Disney Springs. It was ridiculously crowded, so we just walked around a bit and scoped out what souveneirs we might like to buy (on our next visit in a few days) and headed back to the resort for the evening.
Day 3 - We started the day by visiting The Polynesian Resort for a Pre-Birthday breakfast at O'hana. We love it there and do that character meal every visit. We had a cute moment with Stitch when our son stood up to get a photo and he banged his elbow on the table. Stitch rubbed his arm and "kissed" the spot he hurt and my son was laughing before we knew it. My DD got a neat Birthday Card "signed" by Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Lilo and Stitch.
We then took the monorail to the Magic Kingdom. We rode the Haunted Mansion twice, then the Jungle Cruise and we had fast passes for The Seven Dwarves Mine Train. When we got to the line it was HUGE, even the fast pass line! Suddenly a huge storm rolled in and it downpoured. So we took cover across from the ride. When it let up the line was g-o-n-e, so we took ourselves over there and waited just a few minutes. After we came out of the tunnel it was pouring again and we got hit in the face with the rain, but it was really funny. We still laugh about it today! After that we headed for the park exit because we were done and it was still raining. Pirates Of The Caribbean was close for refurbishments so we missed out on that, but we will get on it next time! (I hope)
The rest of the day was spent at the resort. We did that pretty much every day. We would hit the park of choice early and then head back in the later afternoon to nap, swim, eat and play around at the resort.
Day 4 - Epcot was our pick for the day. First we visited Spaceship Earth and both Innoventions sections. We had to go to Club Cool because they changed all the flavors since our last visit. They were still prett gross...lol! We rode Journey Into Imagination with Figment, and of course Soarin' and Living With The Land, we skipped the Seas With Nemo and Friends, but visited the aquarium section. Test Track was on our list but the wait was too long for us. We also decided to take the Behind The Seeds Tour, which was awesome. We got to go back into the green houses and check out all the cool ways that they grow plants and farm fish. It's all the things you see on Living With The Land, but up close. Near the end of the tour, I noticed our DD looked very ill. I panicked becuase we were in the middle of this tour out back in a huge green house and I had no idea where to take her. (of course if we told our tour guide we would have been taken care of) She told me that she was beginning to feel sick about half way through the tour but didn't want to ruin it for the rest of us. I thought she looked like she would pass out, which scared me. I had her drink more water and sit on a bench. Thankfully, at that point the tour was over and we sat her down in air condtioning and she had some water and lunch at Sunshine Seasons. Once she ate and cooled down, she said she felt better and wanted to continue our day and visit the World Showcase. She is a big fan of Japan and really wanted to visit that pavillion.
We walked through all the pavillions, but only spent time in Canada to watch lumberjacks for a minute, Frace (for ice cream), Japan (for quite a while), and Mexico to ride The Gran Fiesta Tour. We then returned to the resort where my daughter started to feel sick again. I had brought some cold meds just in case and she took some and rested. Then next day she felt much better thank goodness!
Day 5 - We went back to the Magic Kingdom because you can't spend just one day there. First DH and DS rode Space Mountain, while DD and I shopped a bit. Then we all went on the Astro Orbiter. Then on to Big Thunder Mountain and DH and DS went on Splash Mountain. I have never been on Splash Mt and I sat out this time because DD didn't want to go and I didn't want her to be alone...so we shopped a bit more. After that we went to the shooting gallery and then took pics with Chip and Dale. Then we doubled back around and went on Buzz Lightyears Space Ranger Spin. We walked around some more, then started heading toward the exit. There was a line for pictures with lady Tremain and The Stepsisters, so we stopped. We had a hilarious photo shoot with them becuause DS (9 yrs old at the time) decided to tell them they were beautiful and see what happens. So he said it and they started fawning all over him and had a tug of war with him in the middle. I think he may be engaged to one of them! Lastly, we had lunch at Caseys Corner and managed to snag one of the last tables available. We went back to the resort and swam and relaxed for the rest of the night.
Day 6 - Birthday - Sweet 16!!! DD chose to go to the T-Rex cafe for her Birthday so we made ADR's and decided to go for lunch. It has gotten harder to get a reservation there since our last visit, but then again we went off season most other visits. DD chose Disney's Hollywood Studios for our park. None of us love it, but we enjoy Star Tours (and hear it had some changes) and DD wanted to meet Baymax and Hiro. We were dissapointed again with this park. Star Tours was good, but not a huge change. The kids went on The Rockin Roller Coaster and The Tower of Terror. We didn't get to meet Baymax or Hiro becuase the times were listed for after we needed to leave to make our ADR. We also skipped Toy Story Midway Mania (our favorite attraction at this park) because the wait was too long and we couldn't get a fast pass back when we were getting those. So, we left and went to DTD. We took a shuttle to Port Orleans Riverside and from there we hopped on one of the ferrys. It let us off and we went to T-Rex Cafe. We ordered chocolate extinction for our daughters Birthday cake (her choice) and I brought a number 16 candle which our waiter stuck in front of the cake and lit, and the wait staff sang for her. Very fun. Once we left T-Rex we went to a bunch of stores and the kids made light sabres and mini droids, we also wen to the Lego Store where they customized some lego figures. Very cute. We walked around some more then headed back to the resort to swim and relax and finish packing our bags for the trip home the next day.
On Day 7 we caught the Magical Express and went to the airport. It was a nice trip and we had a lot of fun! DS says he wants to go back for his 16th Birthday. He says it will not be his Sweet 16, it will be his Super 16. Ha ha ha cute.
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When I saw your title, I knew I had to read your TR. We're celebrating my daughter's sweet 16, though her b-day is in July, not November when we're going.
It sounds like you had a nice time. AKL is on my bucket list. And you had a savannah view??? Awesome!
So glad your dd seemed to recover quickly. Do you think it was the heat?
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