Halloween, Hawaii and holiday celebrations - return to WDW! COMPLETED - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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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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Halloween, Hawaii and holiday celebrations - return to WDW! COMPLETED
Welcome to the final section of this report, which follows on from the final section of our stay at Aulani. You join us on the flight back from Hawaii into Dallas-Fort Worth…
Full details of the rest of our time in Hawaii can be found in part 1 of the Hawaii section, which covers our flight to Hawaii, Aulani, our first meal at Makahiki and our visit to Pearl Harbor and part 2 of the Hawaii section, which covers our days out in the Big Island and Kauai, along with more detail of our stay at Aulani.
Wednesday 13 November – part one: what a beautiful sunrise!
I don’t think either of us had a great night’s sleep on the flight, partially due to the fact that the seats barely reclined (please Virgin or British Airways, start flying on the Hawaii route – then that would shake things up, and all the other airlines would have to improve their flights! ), and partially due to the basketball team coming up to chat away with a couple of their friends who were in our section. Not what we needed!
Mark woke up, not that I was really sleeping anyway, just before we came into land, and they handed out orange juice to everyone. Oh how I long for my passion fruit and guava juice from Hawaiian Airlines!
Soon we started to see the first signs of sunrise, and boy, what a beautiful sunrise it was too!
We came into land, with no circling, and were on the ground at around 6:40am, which was pretty good going, as our landing time was supposed to be 7:25am. We weren’t going to complain about that.
When we got off, we found the nearest bank of monitors, and found that our gate for our flight to Orlando was very nearby. What wasn’t nearby though was a good selection of food. There was really nothing around here, so I suggested heading over to Terminal C, as we had over two and a half hours to kill, and getting breakfast at TGI Friday’s, as we’d enjoyed it there last week.
We were treated to some more gorgeous views of the sunrise as we made our way there…
Once again, I had the Friday’s egg breakfast, fluffy scrambled eggs with breakfast potatoes, wheat toast, and seasonal fruit, but without the sausage or bacon it usually comes with.
Mark had the egg BLT sandwich, toasted brioche bread with melted American cheese, scrambled eggs, bacon, lettuce, tomato and mayonnaise, served with breakfast potatoes and seasonal fruit.
We settled up, and went to browse the shop next door, where I found a Texan longhorn cow toy, which Mark talked me into buying, and then promptly named him Dallas – very appropriate.
Mark also got himself a new book that’s not yet out in the UK, so we both left there very happy.
We made our way back to terminal A and found our gate, and settled down to wait for our flight. As usual, it was a scrum to get on board, with everyone congregated around. I know we say this all the time, but why oh why can’t every airline use Southwest’s way of boarding? It’s so much simpler!
We were right at the back of the plane, and I must admit as we boarded, we were both a bit worried about whether all our carry-on would fit in the overhead lockers and under the seats in front of us, as there weren’t many overhead lockers that weren’t filled. However, the further back we got, the better the situation became, and we had no issues.
As we were informed that we could keep electronic devices on throughout the flight, including take-off and landing, I happily snapped away as we left the ground, and got some pretty neat photos.
Within a few minutes of take-off, we both decided to get some sleep, and the next thing I knew was Mark telling me that we were an hour into our flight. Wow, I guess we really needed the sleep then!
The rest of the flight, I alternated between cat napping, looking out at the land beneath, and grabbing a few photos…
Dallas is so cute! I'm surprised Mark had to talk you into getting him. I really have enjoyed the Hawaii portion of your trip. It's been almost 40 years since we were there and some things looked just the same. But I hardly recognized Laihana (sp?).
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Good idea to head over to Fridays for breakfast. Looked yummy, and you had the time, so why not?! I'm impressed you could sleep at all - nice job! Always love the airplane photos. I do that too.
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At least if you awake that early on the plane, you were rewarded with a beautiful sunrise. The second breakfast at Friday's looked as good as your first. Wonderful pictures from the flight.