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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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So we got back to the hostel and decided to call it an early night. I had trouble sleeping because I was concerned about money issues. Originally, we were going to take a night train from Stockholm to Copenhagen. In fact, I tried booking a couchette (a sleeper car) online from home before the trip. But there were problems in trying to have that happen. I never did get a confirmation or anything. I thought maybe I was too tired. I tried to book the train tickets for both Josh and myself the next morning. I had the same result. We decided we would just purchase a train ticket upon arrival in Sweden. Then as the trip approached we noticed that the cost of a train tickets was getting more and more expensive. Josh looked into getting plane tickets instead. The prices were reasonable. We decided that we would fly. It got close to making our trip and I started making my phone calls to the banks to let them know that I would be possibly using my plastic overseas. I got involved in a conversation with a representative from the bank that issues my checking account debit card. She informed me that the Swedish rail service had gotten approval for the charge two times. I asked if there was a charge and she said no. She also said that there were no holds pending. Basically, she indicated that at any time they could put the charge through. As I lie in bed at the Red Boat I’m wondering and worrying about possibly having my debit card charged for the cost of four tickets from Stockholm to Copenhagen. Additionally, the walls on this boat are rather thin and I hear our fellow guests moving about and talking. Fortunately, the other guests followed the request that the hostel makes by asking guests to keep noise levels down after 11 pm. It was suitably quiet after 11 pm. I got some sleep but not the amount I would like considering I was so worried about my money situation and would I be able to convince Sweden Rail to correct any charges made onto my card.
The Red Boat Mälaren is an old Göta Canal steamer built in 1914. She worked the bays in Mälaren, lake Vänern, and Göta Canal through 1950. After this point she was used to house workers doing reconstruction of bridges near Stockholm. In the late 1960’s a German boaten enthusiast purchased the boat and converted it into a hostel. Currently, she is tied to land in her present location. I think she’s ready to take a trip at any time because we definitely could feel movement.
Our hostel was decked out for Christmas
Josh in front of our hostel
A whole bunch of work was being done to make improvements to our part of Stockholm
To get to the M/S Emelie we passed by the Opera house
Our walk to catch our boat revealed the following scenes
This is the last time I knew for sure I had my umbrella. This is a statue of King Karl XII
The hostel serves breakfast every day. Due to the risk of fire, the breakfast is all cold foods. It costs roughly $10. We opted to save some money and not take the breakfast offered and chose to pick something up along the way.
Today we are off to explore the island of Djugården. According to the information that came with our Stockholm Cards there is a free boat that can take us to this island. There is an inlet at Nybroplan from which we can pick up this boat. Since it seemed like we would not have enough time to take the scenic 50 minute Royal Canal tour I thought that this would be a consolation prize. Unfortunately, there was nothing in the materials that we received or in the Rick Steves’ guidebook that told us where exactly along this inlet is the boat to take to Djugården. The M/S Emelie leaves hourly from Nybroviken. The trip takes 25 minutes. Since we have the Stockholm Card it is free, but it ordinarily is SEK 40 ($5.75). Occasionally, I would take a picture of something of interest along the way. It was somewhere along this journey where I misplaced my umbrella. It is a chilly and overcast wintry day. The threat of rain did loom over us. I felt as if I could have really used that umbrella. Good news is that they do sell umbrellas in Stockholm and I could always pick one up here. I can not tell you how many boats line this inlet, hundreds perhaps? We looked at each and every one looking for the M/S Emelie. Eventually, Josh gets extremely frustrated and demands to know where we are supposed to go. In my exasperation I hand over all of the information over to him and tell him to figure it out. Then he realizes how ridiculous the situation is that we have no information as to where exactly this boat is. This is a pretty big inlet that is shaped like a finger. And it is taking us a long time to walk around it. We haven’t eaten and Josh is getting hungrier by the minute. We finally decide to call a halt to our search and stop and get something to eat. For some reason 7-11s are all over Stockholm. Also, they seem to be the cheapest option for picking up quick food. We spy a 7-11 and Josh picks up something to nibble on. In addition to what you would expect in an American 7-11 there is a very good selection of local food fare. Josh raved about the croissant. While he noshes at a park bench I wander around taking pictures. Once he is finished we take a public bus over to the island. It runs right along one side of the inlet and drops us off at all of the destinations we want to see.
We end up taking the bus to our furthest destination, Skansen. Skansen is Europe’s first open-air folk museum. Basically, it is a park that recreates various areas of Sweden and from different time periods. It’s a way to preserve traditional architecture. Think of it as a mini-Sweden to explore. There are over 150 historic buildings throughout this park. The old farmsteads and houses have been brought here from all over the country. Some of these buildings you can enter and there are actors in period costume who explain what you are seeing. For example, you might enter a pharmacy from the late 1800’s in the south of Sweden and there will be a pharmacist to describe all what goes on in the pharmacy. Since it is winter there aren’t a lot of actors here. Most of them are employed in the summer. In the summer there are music performances and folk dancing performances, public dancing to live bands, and snack carts. We saw none of that. Also since it is winter most of the buildings are closed and you can not enter them. It would be like if you visited the Magic Kingdom and Aloha Isle was empty, the cart for the Turkey legs just sat there abandoned, you could tell there was a souvenir shop, but no souvenirs. You could still experience Peter Pan’s Flight though. So the essentials of the Magic Kingdom were in place, but you still are missing out on the entire experience. Even despite the off-season limited offerings it was definitely worth the trip. There are trees and plants here from all parts of Sweden. My favorite parts were divided between seeing the architecture of the Sami dwellings and the indigenous animals we found in the northern part of the park.
Glad to hear Skansen is worth a visit, and sounds as though summer will be a great time to tour it. We will be going there in July - the last stop of the cruise. But since we are planning to get around using the hop on hop off boat, I am a little worried about finding the stops.
Can't wait to read more!
Great update! It must have been kind of frustrating that Travelocity sent you on this trip during the tourist off-season, when a lot of things weren't fully operational.
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Bad Douglas! Bad, bad, bad Douglas! It has been over 3 years since I’ve taken this trip and started this report. Needless to say much of the details of it I have forgotten. However, I am determined to start again. Except from here on out I will basically be relying on my photographs. Fortunately, I have a tendency to take many photographs so hopefully they will jog some memories.
On the island of Djurgården is a museum all dedicated to the Vasa, a brilliantly preserved 17th century ship. On August 10, 1628 the Vasa set sail on her maiden voyage and sank in the Stockholm harbor. On November 19, 2009, 381 years later, I discover 17th century Sweden.
Once Vasa came out from its port, the sails could catch the wind, but the ship heeled over to port, then heeled again, even farther. Water rushed in through the open gunports and the ship just sank!. Vasa sank, after sailing barely 1300 meters. It had two decks of cannon.
The crew threw themselves into the water or clung to the rigging until rescued, but not all managed to save themselves. After the ship was raised in 1961, the remains of at least 16 people were found. They think a total of 30 out of 150 people on board the ship died. It was thought that the ship sank due to poor design. It lacked stability. The hull was too small and the ballast insufficient in relation to all the cannon that was on board and the amount of rigging. The proportion was just not right.
There was something about the water, its salinity and the fact that it was basically close to shore, meant that the ship was well preserved. It was great to be able to see an honest to goodness ship from the 17th century. The amount of detail in the artwork was incredible.
I am a big fan of tour guides. If there is one available I will take advantage of that. I feel I get so much more out of what I am seeing from their input. Our tour guide was very informative and personable. I do remember she had an odd sense of humor; but that could be something that gets lost in translation between the Swedish and American culture. The tour was about a half hour and FREE!
Josh in front of the VASA
That's me in front of the VASA
Our tour guide point out a feature with her flashlight
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