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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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PassPorter Guide Community Rank: Legend Extraordinaire
Join Date: Feb 2000
Location: Chapel Hill, NC USA
Concierge Level: 6
Posts: 36,592
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Our meals last week
DD and I wanted to let you know that we had great meals at Disney last week.
TS
Mama Melrose dinner
Coral Reef dinner
Yak snd Yeti lunch
Biergarten dinner
Tokyo Dining dinner
All these meals were very good. Outstanding were the steak at MM, the Mahi Mahi at CR, and a seafood curry at Y&Y.
Our CS were
Backlot express. Pretty good salad and veggie sandwiches.
Pizza Planet. The usual ok pizza and salad
Pecos Bill. Terrible taco salads, they've changed the meat. Ugh.
Be Our Guest. Yum! Pork.
Hacienda. Tried the chicken sandwich. Surprisingly good.
Sunshine season. Breakfast platter still hits the spot.
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Making me hungry!! Glad to hear you had a good experience with your meals! We will be trying Mama Melrose & Biergarten for the 1st time on our May trip (along with several others)... can't wait!
I absolutely love Sunshine Seasons and we always do Pizza Planet, mostly for the cupcakes. The cappuccino cupcake I had there last trip was the best dessert I had all week!
PassPorter Guide Community Rank: Legend Extraordinaire
Join Date: Feb 2000
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Coral Reef is just wonderful for atmosphere. I love the blue colors they use and the aquarium wall. The dishes we had there were quite good. Our server was just attentive enough and helpful in making our decisions. We took our dessert to go, but ended up never eating one of them that week. In retrospect, we should have declined a dessert (like we did at Mama Melrose).
Tokyo Dining is an experience. Those Japanese waitresses are so polite and so helpful. Love them. On the dining plan we got two dishes that involved both sushi and fried dishes and they were very tasty. We thought the place would be too loud while we were waiting, but turned out we could hear each other fine. We got there 15 before our ADR time and were seated almost on schedule. They have it down to a science there, it seemed. We would have liked to be near the windows, but we could see out to the lake from a few tables away and we could watch the TV that was showing scenes from Japan on the other side of the restaurant as well.
Eating at Tokyo Dining was a last minute decision. We'd cancelled our ADR for Cape May for that evening the day before and were looking for some place else to eat that night (we weren't sure what our plans would be until that evening). There were quite a few choices available in Epcot, but we chose this place as we hadnt' been there in a while and it sounded good to us right then.
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PassPorter Guide Community Rank: Legend Extraordinaire
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Sounds very yummy!
I have never been to the Biergarten. Every time I go back into that area, the smell bothers me. I am thinking it is the sauerkraut.
Does the smell continue on in the restaurant? Can you tell me about the food at the Biergarten?
PassPorter Guide Community Rank: Legend Extraordinaire
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Biergarten was high on my DDs list of places to go back. Luckily we got a table just after the band started playing so we got to have the entertainment. And you do share a table with other people if you have a group smaller than 8. We joined a family from Indiana with four youngish kids. We really enjoyed talking with them. (The last time we ate there our table partners didn't talk to us at all... ).
The buffet has a wide variety of foods that include some that do give off the vinegar smell, but there is so much that doesn't have that odor that I don't remember noticing it in the restaurant itself. There are cold choices with salad, potato salad, meats, and fruits in one area. There are warm meats, potatoes, mac/cheese and other items in another area, a carving station (dinner only?) with a couple choices of meat (my least favorite...too dry), and a variety of desserts.
There is a very rich beer and cheese soup that was VERY tasty. I really liked the bologna, the hot and cold potato salads, the saurkraut with sausages. I had plenty to eat with just one and half plates.
If you are smelling kraut outside the restaurant, then you are actually smelling it from Sommerfest, the CS place in Germany. The restaurant smells like a restaurant, but unless you are hanging over one of the dishes that is in vinegar or fermented like kraut, you won't be bothered by it. My husband lived in Germany for several years as a child, so this is what he remembers as home-style rather than restaurant style foods. Comforting, tasty, filling. We especially enjoyed the spaetzle (noodles), the best we've ever eaten (and we've eaten lots of them), the pretzel rolls, and the wonderful apple struedel. If you eat meat, try the wurst salad; it's made up of different sausages and quite fun for a "salad." I don't eat meat usually, but had no trouble filling up on the hot dishes and the salad selections, plus a bit of the good salmon. Our selective eater son managed with roasted chicken, potatoes, rolls, and a pudding dessert. With the musical entertainment, its a great place for relaxing fun. The beer is good too!
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Glad to hear you had a good experience with your meals! We will be trying Mama Melrose & Biergarten for the 1st time on our May trip (along with several others)... can't wait!
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