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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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We've had early seating both times. We prefer it, as we eat early at home, so it keeps us on schedule (I guess that would be the "pro"). Plus I don't like to eat late and go to bed stuffed to the gills. The "cons" are sometimes the kids didn't want to go to the show after dinner, or were too tired (more our first trip than the second). If you have a late excursion, you could be rushing around to get to dinner on time (happened to us once in Cozumel).
We had the second seating dinner on our last cruise and we liked it. It gives you the luxury of not having to hurry for dinner. We were concerned about eating dinner early and then not feeling like going to the shows, so by choosing second seating, that gave us the opportunity to not be rushed or being too stuffed to go to a show It also depends on your kids. You know what your kids will be able to handle. Have fun!!
I know that on RCC most of the families did the early seating and at the late seatings there were more "just adult" tables. Is it like that on a Disney cruise??
Yes, that's the tendency, but probably not to as great a degree on DCL. Early seating is almost always wait-listed due to the families with kids that request it. Simply because of the number of families on DCL, fewer get early seating than would like it, meaning more families with kids even on the late seating. There is, however, also a tendency on DCL to group adults without kids on one dining rotation, families with older kids on a different rotation, and families with small kids on the third rotation. During the school year, this is easier to detect than during school vacation periods, when the number of families is especially high.
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We eat early at home and aren't doing any excursions so that isn't an issue for us. We are really taking it easy for our first cruise and being VERY laid back. Basically just taking it all in and sitting back so as to relax after our 6 days in the parks. If the kids don't want to go to the shows we won't make them. I have a feeling they will want to stay in the kids clubs...hey, more alone time with my DH. As a family we are usually early risers and then tend to chill out in the evenings anyway.
We eat early at home and aren't doing any excursions so that isn't an issue for us. We are really taking it easy for our first cruise and being VERY laid back. Basically just taking it all in and sitting back so as to relax after our 6 days in the parks. If the kids don't want to go to the shows we won't make them. I have a feeling they will want to stay in the kids clubs...hey, more alone time with my DH. As a family we are usually early risers and then tend to chill out in the evenings anyway.
That describes us, too, so we opt for early seating. If we're getting up for 8:00 or 9:00 excursions, then the kids need to be in bed around 10 (at the latest) if we don't want Grumpy Grumps on our hands. I can't imagine finishing a meal at 9:30 and then putting the kids to bed right away.
Take this with a grain of salt, however. Because of my daughter's swim practice schedule, we eat dinner before 5:00 at home! (Though we did choose early seating even before this crazy dinner schedule happened to our family....)
We like the later seating so we're not rushed to get to dinner, especially the first night on board. We usually get a little something on deck 9 or through room service to tide us over and by doing that skip an appetizer. Our DDs were the same age as you kiddos on our first cruise and the late seating didn't bother then at all. Another plus is that around 5:00, the pools are fairly empty if they want to swim. On our second cruise they were the only ones in the pool We're also not big on desserts so we usually skip that as well which helps us to not be too full at bed time.
We have done both. I have to say we will never to late dinig again, while the kids are young. We only went to the dining room 2 times with the kids. Both times the 2 year old fell asleep, one DD got sick and another night my D& fell asleep at the table as well. They did not enjoy their meals. However I had high hopes I would like this dining time, and not having the rushed feeling. However your kids are older and most likely be able to have a late seating without problems
We chose late dining because if you are hungry there is always something to eat earlier, including the cheese and crackers through room service. Whenever we go out (including with our son) we eat last. I'd rather have fun first. Then after dinner there's time to take a walk or dance or whatever. If we ate early I'd want to go to bed early, and that's not "vacation" to me. However, my son is almost 9. That makes a difference.
One thing to keep in mind is what time zone you are coming from.
We are early eaters so my hubby and I chose the the early seating for our anniversary cruise last year. It never occured to us the time difference between California and Florida. At 5:30 Florida time (2:30 CA time) we weren't really hungry yet. I think late seating 8:30 FL time (5:30 CA time) would have been better.
I'm thinking we will stick to the early dinner time for now. The only time we might feel rushed is our first night. However if I can schedule us all to be showered (we will go swimming after lunch), dressed and ready to go after the sail away party we should be fine.
Since we aren't doing any excursions we won't feel rushed to get back on the ship. Our Nassau day will be relaxing since we are only getting off the ship to get our passports sighed and then getting right back on. On our Castaway Cay day we are getting off the ship as soon as we can and will board late afternoon. I know being on the beach for several hours will be plenty enough for us.
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One thing to keep in mind is what time zone you are coming from.
We are early eaters so my hubby and I chose the the early seating for our anniversary cruise last year. It never occured to us the time difference between California and Florida. At 5:30 Florida time (2:30 CA time) we weren't really hungry yet. I think late seating 8:30 FL time (5:30 CA time) would have been better.
I've considered this before - keeping the family on PST, so we could stay up until midnight or so and still be to bed at our body's "normal" time. But, that would mean we'd also be sleeping in until 8 or 9, and if I wake up that late I feel like I've missed a good part of the day and/or all the good times for excursions or beach spots...
To combat that, we get up super early on our travel day (4:00 here is 7:00 there), so that when we get to FL late in the afternoon, our bodies have already begun the time shift (read: we're already dead tired). And after a day of travel and either sandwiches from home or airport/airline food, we're ready for a meal when we land!
We loved the late seating. We would have a swim in the near empty pool and then shower and relax during the early meal. The only disadvantage was that we got along so well with our table mates that one night we didn't leave the table until after 10:30 and the night of the Pirates in the Caribbean Party we almost missed the fireworks because we were still chatting in the dining room. Also we were not hungry for the buffet on deck as we had just finished eating.
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It also depends on your kids. You know what your kids will be able to handle. Have fun!! 
(Though we did choose early seating even before this crazy dinner schedule happened to our family....)
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