From no trip to celebrating 20 years together… planning it all in less than 100 days! UPDATED 6/30 - Page 14 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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.
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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Saturday 25 February – part six: will it be worthwhile when we get there?
We headed next for the Sesame Street Safari of Fun, which is aimed at youngsters. So not our sort of thing, but I needed photos for the book…
From there, we started to make our way out of the park, heading through what will be home to their Food and Wine Festival from next weekend. It’s a bit of déjŕ vu, as we were here at a similar time two years ago, and again they were preparing for this, but that’s twice we’ve been, and not managed to enjoy it yet. I’d like to go one day, although it’s only held at weekends, so I can imagine it’s likely to be absolutely packed. I think they are clever though, and they use a part of the park that is usually pretty deserted, so it’s at least getting people to see more of the park…
They also have topiaries here, as you can see. They were still putting the finishing touches to some, but others were completed. I do wonder where they got these ideas from…
We made our way out of the park, and I think we’d literally hit everything we’d wanted to do in just three hours, which was pretty good going. I was really pleased with everything we’d seen and all the photos I’d got, which was of course the main point of coming out here…
We headed out of the parking lot…
… and started to head for Clearwater, as we thought we’d have enough time to get there before meeting up with Tanya at the Don CeSar in St. Petersburg, but it turned out we were being optimistic, and literally by the time we got there, we’d have to leave again, so we changed the instructions to the GPS. All I can say is this was one of the most frustrating journeys we’d had in a long time. Ugh, it took us something like 30 minutes to crawl 10 miles, as you’d keep having to stop at lights. It was not fun at all. I just kept hoping it would be worth it when we got there.
I did get some shots along the way, as we went past some nice areas, although equally we saw some not so nice areas, like the solid waste facility that was signposted (nice!) and then the jail that was next door to the judiciary and the juvenile facility. Talk about keeping it altogether!
I like the hanging spoons over the garden! For a second there I thought they were copying the prayer flags so I had to take a second look. That topiary is gigantic, wow!
Yes, that's Tampa driving to/from the beach areas. For my friend that lives in Largo, that's her daily commute. It's only like 12 miles or something, but it routinely takes 30-45 minutes. And in fact that's why we were a little late in meeting you too! Darn traffic.
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Tanya
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Yes, that's Tampa driving to/from the beach areas. For my friend that lives in Largo, that's her daily commute. It's only like 12 miles or something, but it routinely takes 30-45 minutes.
Oh my goodness, I couldn't imagine doing that every day - that would drive me nuts!
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And in fact that's why we were a little late in meeting you too! Darn traffic.
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Great photos of the orangutans and tigers and such nice closeups! That was funny with the River Rapids ride and Mark shooting the water at that one guy! They have these water guns at Universal for the Popeye and Bluto Barge ride and of course I took advantage of it on a few of those on the ride at the time and I enjoyed seeing their surprise to this!
Hope your drive to Clearwater goes a little bit faster as the traffic is a bit much.
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October 6, 2017-Enjoying an amazing dinner at Victoria & Albert's with PP's Dot and Drew
My TR from my most recent trip is now underway. Includes: Universal Studios Florida, Disney World and Sea World Orlando Trifecta TR -Updated December 10th! TR is now COMPLETED!
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I was really pleased with everything we’d seen and all the photos I’d got, which was of course the main point of coming out here… 
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I'm not a fan of Florida bridges! 
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