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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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I've been looking at some of my old WDW vacation memories, feeling a little "home" sick. So...I want to know, what are your favorite Disney memories?
I'll start with mine!
When I was about 6, we were at the Magic Kingdom doing one of the scavenger hunts. We were having a blast, following Captian Hook's treasure map and doing goofy things until we found our "X marks the spot" in Frontierland. When we got there, who jumped out and greeted us but my favorite...Peter Pan! He congratulated us on our completion of the treasure hunt and signed our autograph books and then, without warning, he took me by the hand and we took off toward the Castle! Along the way, we ran into Captain Hook and we yelled to him "Hook is a Codfish!" until he was out of sight. Then, I rode Peter Pan's Flight with Peter (without waiting in line--a huge deal for a 6-year-old). I've been to WDW so many times and this is still one of my very favorite, most magical memories!
Ok, your turn!
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Amanda =)
Living out a childhood dream during my summer 2015 trip to WDW. Is it time to go back yet?
“All our dreams can come true if we have the courage to pursue them." –Walt Disney
We started going yearly when I was 3, so there are too many to choose from. I like remembering being there with my grandma and my mom when I was a kid. My grandma loved "If You Had Wings" and COP and my mom loved the people mover (TTA) so those are among my favorite memories.
I also remember seeing movies at the Contemporary. They used to show Disney movies there one or two nights a week, IIRC. We saw Cinderella and Bambi and a few others over the years.
So hard to choose!
Probably the trip we took DD when she was 2 and got in line to meet Snow White and Dopey in Fantasyland. She couldn't see over the people in line to know who we were waiting for. When we got near the front she saw, gasped and said "Mommy! Look! It's Snow White and Seven!" Or when she came running back from a photo with Gepetto, autograph book open and said "Look Daddy! Petto's real!"
Leaving from first Disney family vacation in September. We're on the DME heading to the airport. My four-year old daughter sees Spaceship Earth out the window of the bus and starts blowing kisses to it. In between kisses, she says, "I love you, ball (her term for Spaceship Earth). I'll miss you." Almost everybody on the bus starting tearing up.
Leaving from first Disney family vacation in September. We're on the DME heading to the airport. My four-year old daughter sees Spaceship Earth out the window of the bus and starts blowing kisses to it. In between kisses, she says, "I love you, ball (her term for Spaceship Earth). I'll miss you." Almost everybody on the bus starting tearing up.
that is so cute!!!
I have two. My first was back in the 90s with my brother. We rode Splash Mt for over an hour straight during an extra magic hour evening (when you had to pay for them).
My second is when I went with my DH and brother. We had dinner at O'Hanna and my DH got a Lapu Lapu drink. For those that don't know what a Lapu Lapu is, it's 151 rum and pineapple juice served in a hollowed out pineapple. Well, DH puts "eyes" on the top of the pineapple using food and makes it talk like it's a muppet. We had "Mr. Pineapple" commentary throughout our dinner. It was hilarious. I thought he was just being goofy. I didn't realize he was getting trashed until we left and he starts leaning on me (it was only 1 drink). We still talk about the Mr. Pineapple incident.
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Michele
I'm living the dream 20 minutes from Disney! Next trip...tomorrow. Follow me on instagram at ShirtsByShell
Our favorite memory would be our first trip with our kids. We only had two at the time and they were very young. We stayed at CSR when it first opened. We went in October and it was sweltering hot. Since the kids were so small we spent much of the time in the CSR pool. It is where my oldest daughter learned to swim.
My favorite WDW memory will always be seeing my 5 grandchildren standing all smiling with Mickey ears on and ready to go into the park.
We had promised them for years to bring them to WDW and finally their dreams
had came true.
Still brings tears to my eyes when I remember this.
It is so great to get to do WDW all over again with our grandbabies.
We love them so much!!!!!!
One was on my first trip with my friends (being 20 somethings at the time...) we were on the bus coming back from Pleasure Island singing Crocodile Rock in a way that only sounded good to us in our current state... needless to say, the next morning we were on the bus in early, and half the bus started singing Crocodile Rock back at us... it was all in good fun, and we of course joined right back in for round 2!
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I've only been to WDW twice, during the most recent trip it was my mom, my little sister and me. We didn't do any planning, had no idea what time anything was but ended up directly in front of the castle one night and got to see Wishes. It was so magical and beautiful and I just so happy to be there with my family, I cried a little lol!
I have 2. They're both from my trip last year when my mom joined me for 4 nights. The first is that in the morning of our first day we happened to see Goofy & since there really wasn't a line (maybe 4 or5 people ahead of us) we decided to get in line to meet him. My mom went first & Goofy started dancing around with her. Then it was my turn & I managed to kiss him on the nose. He put his hands over his heart & staggered around before ending up on one knee. I managed to get a great picture of him & my mom dancing. The second one is also from that first day. We decided to ride BTMRR & at some point during our first ride (we rode it about 5 times that day) my mom & I looked at each other & just started laughing. Actually the whole time my mom was there would probably be my favorite Disney memory for a sevral reasons. First it was my mom's first time to DW & only her 4th trip to Disney (the other being to DL 2 of them when I was little & the 3rd about 15 years ago when they met my uncle & much younger cousins there) and she'd always wanted to see Epcot. This was also the first time that we had done an overnight trip together as adults and the first time in over 30 years that we had done any sort of a trip without my stepdad (whom I adore). Thanks to the deal I got from Disney I was able to buy her park tickets so she just paid for her plane ticket & food & stayed in my room with me. I think her trip cost her maybe $500. I also surprised her by buying her a refillable mug.
- my 30th birthday when my parents paid for my birthday dinner at 1900 Park Fare with Eeyore - no mean feat, as they were in the UK and only called up an hour or so beforehand, when they found out where we were eating.
- spending the most magical day with my best buddy Wendy and her DH last year, when they flew down for the day, just to spend it with us
- at Tokyo Disney, where we finally found Grumpy and DH got to meet his favourite character at last.
I actually have 3 moments that all happened on the same trip and they happened when Katie was 2. She was always afraid of the Easter Bunny and Santa and I thought it was going to be scary for her at Disney. The first character she met was Baloo. She walked right up to him and gave him a hug. And then the same happened with all the other characters. WOW. The second was at Ariel's Grotto. She went up to meet her favorite Ariel and Ariel called her by name!! She was in awe. "How does she know my name?" And the last was when we went to Crystal Palace and Her all time favorite(still is) Pooh came to our table. She just stared at him. I don't think she could believe he was real. It was priceless.
One was on my first trip with my friends (being 20 somethings at the time...) we were on the bus coming back from Pleasure Island singing Crocodile Rock in a way that only sounded good to us in our current state... needless to say, the next morning we were on the bus in early, and half the bus started singing Crocodile Rock back at us... it was all in good fun, and we of course joined right back in for round 2!