The 'This Trip Keeps Getting Longer' Trip: PTR - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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.
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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
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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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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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greetings! it's been a while! and yes, yes, i know--i'm really bad at finishing trip reports. i believe i left my last one hanging, and that was maybe a year ago?anyway--hi! i'm back, and i'm starting a new PTR which will hopefully lead into an actual TR. we shall see about that. but for now, the exciting details of my upcoming trip(s)...
who: me, my husband doug (huge disney fan, huger star wars fan), my mom peg and her adult step son, chris. what: a legitimate vacation for my husband and me where: marriott property TBD, wilderness lodge, old key west, and AKL. when: friday, october 21st - sunday october 30th!!!! why: because my husband deserves some disney magic
why this trip is exciting
i go to disney a lot. like...more than i should even really talk about, given that i live nowhere near disney. i typically only go for a day or even part of a day, when i'm traveling for work. i also go a lot with my mom, as it is her most favorite place in the world and she deserves to do whatever she wants (see also: my other trip reports). also, this year i'm going to more than one disney resort. i'm leaving for paris the day after tomorrow () and it's highly likely that i'll be in disneyland in anaheim in december (there are 35 days between disneyland paris and this WDW trip, and then 30 days between WDW and DL. yeah. oh and then i'm going back to WDW in january. )
but this trip? this trip is special. because i'm taking my husband.
this is my husband:
as you can see, he's a fun guy.
we've had kind of a rough year. you see, last april, i lost my job. more specifically, i was fired (long story. short version: it was not my fault. i promise. really.) on the same day, my mom was diagnosed with stage 3 breast cancer. i've written about that here before. so i spent all of 2015 from april until the end of the year and the first two months of 2016 looking for work. and then i sort of found a job...and found out *i* had cancer.
several months and one very, very, VERY scary surgery later, i'm ok. for a while, we didn't think i would be. we still aren't positive, but i feel 1000% better (yes, i know that's an illogical number) and my doctor has given me the best outlook one can get. i also am working again, in a role i love and with a schedule that works for me. basically, everything is better (for now). so we are going to disney world.
ok, so here's the thing. my disney trips almost always grow out of control. this one is no different. so here's what happened:
my mom is a DVC member. she owns at three different resorts--saratoga, the boardwalk, and the floridian. but i'm trying to try out all of the DVC resorts. so for this trip, we chose old key west as our home base. (note: we also chose OKW because a. the boat to disney springs is compelling, as we will be doing some late nights and b. heather works there and we love heather.) mom booked us in an one bedroom villa, as that's what she had the one time she stayed there and she loved it. also, she has more points than she could reasonably use this year, so it wasn't a budgeting thing.
mom always travels sunday-friday, as she's now retired and that's the cheapest time to travel. however, when this because a Vacation with a capital 'V' for my husband, we decided to stretch it out over both weekends as well. because if he's going to take off from work, he's going to VACATION as much as possible.
so mom added a night at wilderness lodge on the beginning of the trip--just one night, saturday night--to start out the trip, assuming we would arrive on saturday.
but wait. it gets more complicated.
so then we were like: why are we flying home on friday when doug doesn't have to be at work until MONDAY? and mom had yet more points, so she got us on a waitlist at AKL Jambo house. and that just came through the other day.
so then i was: one night at WL, five at OKW, and two at AKL.
and THEN we went to book flights. and it saved us $300 total to fly down on friday morning rather than saturday morning (and we didn't want to lose a whole day by flying down saturday night). so my husband added a day off to his work calendar, and now we are staying somewhere that first friday night. we just don't know where yet.
so...help us decide!
it will be an off site hotel, and a marriott, as i have hundreds of thousands of marriott points, and free is good. also, we are flying into stanford, so we would have to take a taxi anyway--thus it benefits us not at all to spend the money on, say, a value resort. because we couldn't take the magical express anyway.
ok. that being said, for your first night, which would you pick?
(note: we will be landing around noon on friday, so esitmate we will arrive at our hotel by 2pm at the latest, as we don't check bags and we are just hopping in a taxi.)
a. a marriott on a golf course halfway between the airport and WDW. we'd likely swim in the afternoon and then maybe take an uber to disney springs that night.
b. the gaylord, which is a giant hulking convention hotel with, like, a rainforest inside. we'd stay there for the evening and make it a destination.
c. a boutique hotel in celebration, on a lake and walking distance to local restaurants and a piano bar on site. small pool. we would spend the evening drinking and eating and sitting on the balcony watching the sun set over the lake.
d. a crappy business class marriott, from which we would uber to disney springs for the evening.
no matter what, we are then getting up on saturday morning and taking a taxi to wilderness lodge to drop off our stuff and then continuing on toward epcot. i may actually just have the uber driver wait for us as we run in, store our bags, and run back out, continuing on to epcot without the hassle of the bus.
Ok, I've had a glass of wine (it is past five o'clock over here, I promise ) so I don't think I'm the best to offer advice on your very complicated accommodation plans. Wow!
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Oh yeah, a Tracy TR!
I'm voting Gaylord. Mainly because I want to stay at the Gaylord at National Harbor. So I'd be vicariously staying there. At a different location.
Another vote for Gaylord as I've stayed at that one and it is awesome! I've also stayed at the Opryland Hotel, which is also Gaylord. Both are very deluxe.
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) and it's highly likely that i'll be in disneyland in anaheim in december (there are 35 days between disneyland paris and this WDW trip, and then 30 days between WDW and DL. yeah. oh and then i'm going back to WDW in january. 
) 
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Pixie Dust
Wow!! a lot sure has happened to you and I am sending tons of 
your way!!
PassPorter Guide Author
) so I don't think I'm the best to offer advice on your very complicated accommodation plans. Wow! 
They all sound like great options though.
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