By Laura Tracy for The Travel Exchange

So, you’re going to Disney World and you can hardly contain your excitement. The only downer is that you are going with a hater. Now, hater might be too strong a word, but to you, they might as well be. These are the people who think that Disney is overrated, overpriced, and overcrowded all based on an experience that they had in July when they were 7 years old. So, how do you cope? How do you plan? And how do you change someone’s mind?
They don’t get it, and they aren’t going to no matter how much you yammer on about Cinderella’s Royal Table, so let it go for now. You will have to resign yourself to sharing your plans with other Disney friends and family and not dwell on their lack of excitement. If you push it, you may lose them before you even board the Magical Express!
They don’t get it, and they aren’t going to no matter how much you yammer on about Cinderella’s Royal Table, so let it go for now. You will have to resign yourself to sharing your plans with other Disney friends and family and not dwell on their lack of excitement. If you push it, you may lose them before you even board the Magical Express!
First, consider getting a travel agent. While you could probably walk through the park with your eyes closed, you never know what you might not know, and google searches are only as good as the terms you select to search. By getting a travel agent (which costs you $0 by the way) you will have an objective perspective from someone who truly is an expert (imagine you if planned 20 to 30 trips per year, lol) as well as someone who has planned trips for varying levels of Disney obsession. A good travel agent will not only tailor their advice to your unique situation, but they will also provide the level of service that you need; hands on or hands off.
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Next, keep it simple, do NOT over-plan. This is quite possibly the biggest mistake that excited planners can make when traveling with someone new to Disney. You think, ‘oh my, we have to do everything so that you know WHY I love it so much’. But, no, you don’t have to do everything, you can’t, and you shouldn’t try. First off, this puts enormous pressure on both you and your guest. Pressure to run from attraction to attraction, hit every show, have multiple dining reservations in one day, and (worst of all) pressure to LOVE it all. Your guest will not be able to deny the work that you put into this planning and will feel pressured to have a good time (or act like they are even if they aren’t). Also, when was the last time you truly enjoyed a vacation where you literally “ran” from one thing to another? It’s sometimes overwhelming, even to those of us that are committed (pun intended).
Eat like you mean it. This means, don’t squeeze in every single character meal (especially if you are an adult couple, this just gets weird by the 3rd or 4th one), and don’t feel like you need more than one dining reservation per day. Disney has a ton of dining to choose from, and next time you go you can try new restaurants, but for now try to keep yourself to one table service meal per day. Also, try to coordinate your meals so you are eating quick service meals a bit early or late to avoid crowds. Haters tend to complain about crowds more than anything, so try to mitigate that before it can even become an issue.
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Make strategic use of your “extra magic hours” and fastpasses. This is HUGE and quite possibly the most important piece of advice in this post. Long lines can turn a fun day sour very quickly. If you use morning magic hours (usually 8-9am) you can get an hour in where there are almost no lines for anything. By pre-planning fastpasses for that park immediately following the morning hour, you could get 4 nice hours of line-free park time. Once you use your first 3 fastpasses, you can make one additional fast pass at a time by using the My Disney Experience app or by visiting a park kiosk (it's called a rolling fast pass). By fastpassing in demand rides as early as possible (either with the 3 initial fast passes or with one of your early rolling fastpasses), you can then leisurely enjoy the lower lines at less in-demand attractions and shows (and of course shopping) as you travel from one to the next. I went on a trip recently, where we didn’t even do an in-demand attraction unless we had a fastpass and it was one of the most relaxing and fun trips we have had to date.
Long story less long: don’t drive yourself crazy trying to make the trip perfect. Disney has this magical way of becoming perfect if you relax, sit-back, and let it happen. With a little strategic pre-planning (not over-planning) and some pixie dust from a travel agent, your companion may find themselves on their way to fandom sooner than you think. Mine sure did, he asked me about going back for our 7th trip together just the other day!