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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Who – Me (42), 8 trips to WDW. Horse farm manager, Disney-Lover, Wife and Mom!
Daughter (9), 2 trips to WDW. Loves animals, soccer and is an amazing soul!
We live in New Hampshire and LOVE it there in January. I could NOT imagine going between May and October with the heat!
What – A last “Kid” trip for Daughter (and our budget). Daughter will turn into a Disney Adult in Feb 2017. After our trip this year I knew we need to do all we could to get back 1 more time before her price increase!
Where – POP Century! I love it there! Lake facing standard room, #5118 would be awesome again!
When – 7 – 14 January 2017
Why – Do we REALLY need a “Why”??
As I mentioned above we went to the World this year, 9-17 January. Hubby also went with us then, but he is a “once every 3 years” kind of Disney traveler.
We stayed at POP for the first time, and we fell in love. We are a Value resort family, we sleep there, we shower there, we swim there and we grab a QS there.
Another thing about this trip...It is a surprise trip for Daughter! SO HARD to keep the secret! Having just taken a trip makes planning for what she wants to do easier, and the fact that I am already a Disney-Freak and always have a trip on my mind helps when I am just sitting on the computer at night doing our plans! Daughter says every day that she wishes she was at Disney and asks when we are going again. HARD not to tell her! Hard not to celebrate with her each milestone (ADRs, buying plane tickets). Hubby will listen, but not be excited. I do have a friend at work who gets excited with me, though! I plan on telling Daughter at Christmas. For Christmas gifts we only give each other 4 gifts, a WANT, a NEED, a WEAR and a READ. For her WANT I am going to give her some trader pins and for her WEAR (which will be the big finale gift) I am going to give her a shirt I got from TeePublic that has the 4 icons on it and says “Follow me Home” and I will also put her MagicBand in there.
So, up coming posts will include:
Bit of a review of our last trip
ADR Thoughts and what I got
FP+ thoughts and plans (and what we get when the time comes)
and Tweeks between now and then, of course!
How exciting to be planning a surprise trip! I know how hard it is keeping it a secret...we are doing trips for our grandkids and they are both secrets!
Registered Message Board Members save 30% off PassPorter guidebooks! When you register you'll have access to a discount coupon good for 30% off the list price of PassPorter books in our online store.
So as I said last post, our last trip was 9-17 January 2016.
This trip was amazing. We really had no complaints about anything! We tried a new resort, POP, and loved it. We loved the view from our room, the size of the resort and the dining options.
Our park days went like this:
Day 1 – Arrival Day – Evening at EPCOT
Day 2 – MK Day #1
Day 3 – EPCOT Day #2
Day 4 – HS Day
Day 5 – AK Day
Day 6 – Day Off
Day 7 – EPCOT Day #3
Day 8 – MK Day #2
Day 9 – Departure
I think that was a perfect amount of time. I would of liked more tie at EPCOT, really, I felt like I did not have a lot of time to explore!
For this next trip I am doing 1 less day. I hope I don't miss that day at EPCOT!
I have tinkered with the idea of adding a day, but I got perfect ADRs (which you will see) and I would really have to tweek those too much.
A few things I learned from the last trip:
1- Don't make fast passes for early. Get to the park at opening and ride what you want then. Save your passes for the late morning/early afternoon. Or, what I think we will do, is make them for right before our midday break and make a new FastPass before we leave the park for when we plan on coming back once we used all of those first 3.
2- Dining plan. I love it. A few things though...
A- Remember to use your snack credits! We had like 10 or 12 left at the end of the trip and no where to pack the food!
B- Plan your meals well so no one gets HANGRY or so you are not in a food coma and cannot enjoy the meals. This I still have to work on. I want to try all the new stuff and get random reservations. Next trip I will put more thought into when we normally eat/snack and try to work around that so we are not wanting to kill each other because we have not eaten! Also planning out buffets before and after lighter meals so we have the stomach for them all.
C- We brought some snacks from home. Most of them sounded good when we were at home, but once we were there...not so much. We did bring some homemade beef jerky and that was awesome...and also some small packs of Target Monster Trail Mix. Once again, we had ALL those unused snack credits that could of helped there.
3- Pin. More pins. Daughter and I had a pin trading addiction. It was so fun to trade with the cast members! However, the 50 pins I bought on Ebay for trading did not last all that long! By the end of the trip we were buying cheap sets at the pin sellers and using them as traders. More pins next time. I will also admit, about 50% of the Ebay pins I got were scrappers. HOWEVER about 50% of the pins we got from cast members were also scrappers. I trade for the cool pins, not for their value, so it does not matter to me. But I do know it is a major thing with hardcore pin traders.
4- Park bag. The backpack really was too much. Husband used his satchel sometimes, but that only worked because 1- HE carried it, not ME and 2- he did not do many of the fast rides. I did use my Vera cross body bag I got at Savers and I LOVE the size of it, however it will not fit snacks and a water bottle at the least and it will for sure not fit whatever we are having characters sign. Need to be on the hunt for a perfect, comfy bag for next time! Oh yea, it also needs to be easy to open so going through security bag check is quick!
5- Shoes. Bring 2 comfy pair. Well broken in for lots of walking. I have a pair of New Balance walkers that I actually wore for our last Disney trip that are SO comfy! I also brought a pair of Nike sneakers. On days we went back to the room for a rest, I would change shoes just to help my foot fatigue. It worked. My feet were never sore. Which brings me to...
6- Walking. I walked about 85 miles in the 8 park days. Luckily I am very active at work so it was not too bad on me. But I imagine if you work a desk job, or cashier etc job, you will need to prep for all that walking!
How exciting to be planning a surprise trip! I know how hard it is keeping it a secret...we are doing trips for our grandkids and they are both secrets!
Can't wait to hear what's in store!
Thank you! I am following your PTR for one of your trips!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cam22
Great start to your DD's surprise trip!
Thank you!
Quote:
Originally Posted by clio
Great start. I'm sure she'll really be surprised.
Liz
Thank you! I think she will be very surprised...I hope so anyway!!
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Thank you! I am following your PTR for one of your trips!
aww, thanks!
Love your tips and lessons learned! Each trip we all learn something new and from each other! Great idea about the shoes, I just need to have two pair of sneakers, I guess...I'll tell DH you suggested it!
So, I was really unsure if this trip would happen. As we were driving to Maine for Easter (and Daughter was asleep in the back) I tossed out the trip idea to Hubby, and to my overwhelming SHOCK and excitement he agreed to it! So on 30 April I booked our room, and once packaged were released (21 June) I switched the room only to a package!
Daughter has pretty firm ideas on where she wants to eat. This being her 3rd time, I kind of like this routine she has decided on.
Arrival night supper at Akershus. I think this is just an awesome way to start. Great princess interaction, great food, at our fave part!
First morning breakfast at Chef Mickey's. This also has the great characters but also the plus of a ride on the monorail right away!
On our AK morning we get the first ADR slot at Tusker House. LOVE the selection there and love getting on the safari first thing.
Last evening supper at Liberty Tree Tavern. A great transition back home with some down home cooking.
Lastly, in the middle, Daughter loves Teppan Edo.
That TOTALLY does not leave much room for anything else, but I have a few new ones added this trip.
SO, here is how it broke down:
7 Jan – wanted Akershus at 5:00pm, got 5:30pm
8 Jan – wanted Chef Mickey at 10:30am, got it
9 Jan – wanted first Tusker House, got 8:00am
10 Jan – wanted Afternoon Tea @ GF at noon, got it
wanted Whispering Canyon at 5:00pm, got it
11 Jan – wanted Raglan Road at 5:00pm, got it
12 Jan – wanted Teppen Edo at 5:00pm, got 5:00
13 Jan – wanted Liberty Tree late lunch, got 2:00
I know, nothing really earth shattering, and it being in January I fully expected to get what I wanted.
So for the new...I thought that the Afternoon Tea on a Mom and Daughter only trio would be just awesome, I am so excited for this one! I keep hearing the praised sung about Raglan Road, lets try it! Gets us to DS! I really want to go to Sanaa, but I think that is to be saved for when Hubby comes again, he will really enjoy that! I also changed out usual Liberty Tree SUPPER to a Lunch. I want to try the Ooey Gooey Toffee Cake!
So, once they were done, I of course had to tweek just a LITTLE bit...
I read SO much good about Garden Grill, and Daughter is on a Biscuits and Gravy kick, so...
12 Jan now looks like:
8:05 Garden Grill and
6:10 Teppen Edo (I moved this a bit later s we were not in a food coma from breakfast still!)
In the past we have tried: Biergarten (too much meat for me), Marrakesh (cute, ok food), Boma (good, not got Daughter, though), O'Hana (not impressed with the slow service), 1900 Park Fare (breakfast, ok selection, atmosphere seemed dated and needing an update), The Plaza (over priced, slow service), BOG (did it, would go back for lunch).
So, there they are! I hope I don't tweek much more!
Loving your dining choices! Makes me hungry for lunch!
Looks like you did very well getting your choices! I think you will really like the Afternoon tea with your daughter! Very special!
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Dining plans look wonderful! 
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