Living the Dream and remembering the Bagman COMPLETED 5/16 - Page 8 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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.
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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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It's uncanny the photos you captured! Peter Gay, Kenneth Waldie, and David Kovalcin all worked for my company (although at different locations, so I didn't know them). Andrew Charles Curry Green was in my high school graduating class.
As I was posting this earlier on, I did wonder whether anyone would say they knew the names. I kind of had a feeling someone might.
Too bad you were just in the clouds for ONe WTC Observatory and couldn't see a thing. Other than that it looks like you enjoyed your time in the building with the history and info.
We did. It was just a shame about the cloud, but if I could control the weather, just think how rich I'd be...
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It does amaze me with some people and the selfies at the reflection pool, which is a memorial. Looks like a good start to your time here and looking forward to the rest of it. I have yet to visit this museum, but plan too.
I was here about a month or so after 9/11 for a U2 concert that night and seeing all of the destruction up close and the smell of the air from the still smoldering buildings as well as the dust from the pulverized buildings overwhelmed me. Just seeing it first hand was just something.
Oh my goodness. Your description is just sending chills through my bones. Good grief. I cannot begin to imagine that.
Saturday 1 October – part four: understanding the enormity of what you’re seeing
We descended to see this first in the 9/11 museum, which I thought was very moving on its own…
This map told its own story, and it’s the first time I’d seen it laid it out this starkly….
Then you go through this area, which is a lot of people discussing their feelings of the day. I wasn’t sure of the relevance of this section, if I’m being honest. It seemed to be a random selection of people, and perhaps people with more relevance to what happened – i.e. families of victims or rescue teams etc. would’ve worked better here.
Then you’re greeted with this scene beneath you…
We kept catching up with one of the museum’s guided tours, and to be honest, if you weren’t in this, it was a bit of a pain, as people bottle necked horribly to listen to their guides. As a result, I just saw this, and had no clue what it was for a few minutes until I could get close enough to the board to read all about it…
The next thing you come to is this…
… and then you see this:
At first, again like the earlier exhibit, you’re not 100% sure what it is, and as we got closer, you could see more of it.
Eventually, we got to the plaque, and the whole enormity of what you were seeing opened up in front of you:
Then you read this, and realised you were in Ground Zero, albeit of the first terrorist attack to hit the towers, many years before 2001…
We then moved into this area, which had some of the posters of those who were missing in the aftermath. Of course, in those days, Facebook wasn’t quite as rampant as it is now, so people still resorted to the good old fashioned methods to try and track down their loved ones….
Then you’re presented with this beautiful vista:
I thought it was beautifully done.
Next you come to the survivors’ staircase…
You can walk down alongside it, to get a good look at it, which of course we did. I was amazed at the damage halfway down, as until that part, the stairs were completely intact. Surely they couldn’t have been that badly damaged on 9/11, as otherwise how the heck would people have got out? I asked one of the members of staff, and she explained they were damaged when they took out the escalators next door to it. At first they didn’t realise it was the staircase used by the survivors, and by the time they did, it had been damaged to the extent you see today.
All of it sure makes you stop and think. And it's a shame that already, only 15+ years later, people aren't giving the respect.
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All of it sure makes you stop and think. And it's a shame that already, only 15+ years later, people aren't giving the respect.
Now you put it like that, it really makes me think. Honestly anyone under the age of 20 won't have a personal memory of what happened that terrible day, will they? Gosh. Scary it already that long ago.
I think I'd sob thru the whole thing. I still remember every moment of that morning - including the perfect blue sky.
I think because we only saw the footage from when the first plane crashed, I didn't realise it was such a beautiful day weather wise before it happened. That's what really stood out for me in that first striking image.
I'm with Colleen. I get chills reading or seeing anything related to 9/11. We were on our way to the shore.
I was driving home, having finished the breakfast shift reading the news. I was glued to the TV news when I got home, but you know the strange thing now? If they want to show the actual footage of 9/11 to a group, they have to get permission from everyone in the group, as it's now considered too harrowing to watch without a warning beforehand. Makes you think, doesn't it, as we just watched it as it happened with no such warnings....
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It's quite an exhibit and memorial and looks very well done! You certainly have covered it well! I need to visit this one day and hope to within a few months being within an hour of NYC. I will never forget that day as the horrific events unfolded that day on such a large scale. I was glad my brother was fine that day as he was working in NYC that day. He saw the second plane hit from his office building a couple of miles away.
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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!
It's quite an exhibit and memorial and looks very well done! You certainly have covered it well! I need to visit this one day and hope to within a few months being within an hour of NYC. I will never forget that day as the horrific events unfolded that day on such a large scale. I was glad my brother was fine that day as he was working in NYC that day. He saw the second plane hit from his office building a couple of miles away.
Oh my goodness, I can't imagine how terrifying it must have been to witness that first hand.
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I so want to go to the museum but I don't know if I'd be able to take it!
It is incredibly well done and maybe by the time you've seen it through my trip report, it will give you the strength to go there, as it is a beautiful memorial and a great tribute to everyone who died.
I need to go in the museum next time I'm in NYC. I've been the to the memorial outside several times, but the first time I was there, the museum was still being built.
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Finally all caught up. Glad you got to spend some more time with Meg shopping in the Disney Store. I agree that World of Disney was much better. Sorry about the rough start to your morning and having zero visibility on the Observation Tower. Your picture from the memorial and museum are very moving. I still haven't been able to bring myself to visit the memorial. I live near the state capitol of NY and our State Museum has a lot of artifacts. Anytime I visit the museum, I still sob walking through that part.
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Just seeing it first hand was just something.
You certainly have covered it well! 
I need to visit this one day and hope to within a few months being within an hour of NYC. 
I will never forget that day as the horrific events unfolded that day on such a large scale. I was glad my brother was fine that day as he was working in NYC that day. He saw the second plane hit from his office building a couple of miles away. 
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