Living the Dream and remembering the Bagman COMPLETED 5/16 - Page 5 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Nice time at the Hard Rock with Meg and an overall pretty good meal. The last time I ate here was in 2009 when there was a Decade of Dreams event for dining here and then seeing "Mary Poppins" on Broadway, which I really enjoyed!
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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!
Nice time at the Hard Rock with Meg and an overall pretty good meal. The last time I ate here was in 2009 when there was a Decade of Dreams event for dining here and then seeing "Mary Poppins" on Broadway, which I really enjoyed!
Oh wow, I remember the Decade of Dreams events from WDW only too well. I had no idea that's where the NYC part of the event took place - cool!
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Friday 30 September – part six: the mouse in the big apple!
We made our way over to the Disney Store, and what a welcome we got when we arrived. The guy at the door spotted that we were both wearing Disney Cruise Line waterproof jackets (well sort of waterproof, you get the idea… ) and immediately asked us about those, and was very surprised when we told him we’d walked off the Dream this morning. Wow, it surprised me, as it felt like such a long time ago…
Frankly I wasn’t expecting that much from the Disney Store, as I hadn’t heard great things about it since it was converted from the World of Disney, which I did have very fond memories of from our 2008 visit. However, it was actually better than I expected.
It was bigger, with two stories, and they had loads of great New York City merchandise. I ended up getting a Statue of Liberty Minnie, although I rejected all the T-shirts, as I didn’t think they’d fit me. Mark was having the same issue, and we were all discussing how the shaping of T-shirts has changed, and they seem to be getting smaller and smaller. Not what Disney should be conveying as a message, I feel…
I ended up getting an Eeyore sweatshirt, which apparently had only arrived in store two days earlier – it was meant to be!
I have to say I wasn’t sure about the sweatshirt, but Meg and Mark talked me into it, and I’m so glad they did, as I adore it and have worn it so much since then.
Mark also got another Grumpy T-shirt, so we did quite well…
I had to arrange the Eeyores so they were looking out, as they don’t like to be facing down, don’t cha know?
When we were done in there, we made our way back to the hotel, stopping for some photos on the way, and also some selfies…
On the way, we stopped off at Walgreens to see if they had any pink Camay soap bars for my dad. Do not ask me why he uses this, but apparently he does, and that was my mum’s request when I asked her what she wanted brought back with us. We’d failed in Boston, and we failed again in here, although unbelievably the next day I got a message from Meg. She’d found them in the neighbourhood pharmacy, and by the sounds of it, cleared them out completely, and sent them to me. so much – you really are a star!
We headed back and sadly said our goodbyes to Meg. It was lovely to see her again, but I just wish we’d had more time with her and she’d let us pay for dinner..
We made it back to the room just before 9:00pm, and I got another couple of photos from the room before we went to bed.
It was definitely the right decision not to go to Cirque. Sure, I was sad to miss it, but we would never have stayed awake for it.
The weather today was hot and humid with temperatures in the 80s in Florida, but very wet with temperatures in the low 60s in New York City. The best thing today was spending so much time with Meg. The worst thing today was the rain and the problems with our flight into LaGuardia. Today we tried visiting the Disney Store in New York City And the result was it was cool, but nowhere near as good as the old World of Disney. The most magical moment today was seeing Meg again.
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Nice photos of Times Square! Too bad for all of the rain in the city! Glad you were able to make a couple of purchases at the DS!
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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!
Saturday 1 October – part one: meeting Mrs. Unhelpful
We were awake even before the wake-up call we’d set for 7:00am, so we got going. I got some more shots of the view from our room while it was less rainy…
We hauled our cases down to bell services, and the guy on the desk told us off for doing that. In retrospect, he was right. We weren’t that far from the elevators, but it was a silly thing to do, and we were exhausted by the time we got down there. It wasn’t a great start to the day. Ok, lesson learned…
We headed out…
We’d already decided to go to McDonald’s for breakfast. Oh my goodness, so not a good move. This was like a dive inside. I didn’t get many interior shots, and certainly not where we sat, as I was too scared frankly to take any photos. We had a couple of guys begging, and we have never eaten so quickly anywhere. I just felt very uncomfortable the whole time.
We made our way to the subway, dreading what we were going to find there, after our breakfast experience. We got accosted by one guy begging, but thankfully that was about it for the day. He was out of luck anyway, as it was the last day of vacation, and we were almost out of money. Everything was going on the credit card…
We went up to ask for a single day pass for the subway, only to be told they didn’t do one. It seemed very odd, as I thought it would be a staple for visitors. We explained we’d probably need four subway trips, and the woman told us what we needed to get. Ok so far… we passed through the credit card, and she told us she could only take cash. No explanation of how to pay by credit card – we had to actually ask her. She was so unhelpful.
We went to one of the machines, and eventually worked out what we needed, after having to go back and ask Mrs. Unhelpful. Then the classic – we went to pay by credit card, and it asked for a zip code. I’m sorry – really? You get how many tourists a year and only Americans can use a credit card in the machine? That didn’t seem right. I thought about for a moment, went through the whole process again, and just ignored it and pressed enter when it asked for a zip code, and thankfully that worked. It was certainly not easy, and we had to buy each card separately.
We set off, hoping the rest of our journey would at least be a bit simpler. I managed to find downtown trains Ok (again, not the best signage ) and recognised route 1 that went to South Ferry, as I knew we’d been there before, and that should take up somewhat near to the One World Observatory. We hopped on it, and I managed to fathom from the map which stop to get off at. I was originally planning on taking either route 2 or 3, but neither was showing up when we got there. Ok, lesson learnt – have a back-up plan!
We got off at Chambers Street…
… and when we got off, we didn’t know which way to go, and of course Google Maps was being completely useless. I did have a city map in my backpack, but I didn’t even want to remove it from the backpack, I felt so unsafe here. That feeling was actually added to by the three or four police officers with semi-automatic guns. I know they’re there for reassurance, as have the same spiel at home, but all it does is terrify me, as I’m just not used to seeing this sort of thing. It makes me wonder what they’re expecting to happen, if you know what I mean.
I summonsed up the courage to go up to the only one that just had a pistol, and asked him, and he was really nice, and explained, although when we came out, we still weren’t sure where to go. What the heck happened to all the road signs here? Thankfully a guy, who’d obviously overheard our conversation, pointed us in the right direction, and we were on our way.
The police officer had told us that One World Observatory would be easy to spot immediately, but actually it wasn’t. It wasn’t until we got quite close that we finally saw it, along with the rest of the World Trade Center complex.
I don’t know why, but I was surprised there was still so much construction work going on here. I shouldn’t have been, as I knew the work was still ongoing on the transport hub, but it did still surprise me.
Next: I don’t think we’ll be “seeing forever” today
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The last time I ate here was in 2009 when there was a Decade of Dreams event for dining here and then seeing "Mary Poppins" on Broadway, which I really enjoyed! 
) and immediately asked us about those, and was very surprised when we told him we’d walked off the Dream this morning. Wow, it surprised me, as it felt like such a long time ago… 
Mark was having the same issue, and we were all discussing how the shaping of T-shirts has changed, and they seem to be getting smaller and smaller. Not what Disney should be conveying as a message, I feel… 
so much – you really are a star! 
and she’d let us pay for dinner.. 
We got accosted by one guy begging, but thankfully that was about it for the day. He was out of luck anyway, as it was the last day of vacation, and we were almost out of money. Everything was going on the credit card… 
It seemed very odd, as I thought it would be a staple for visitors. We explained we’d probably need four subway trips, and the woman told us what we needed to get. Ok so far… we passed through the credit card, and she told us she could only take cash. No explanation of how to pay by credit card – we had to actually ask her. 
She was so unhelpful. 
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