EPCOT has become the “Park of Festivals” over the past couple years.  The only time that a festival is not going on at EPCOT is between Memorial Day to the weekend before Labor Day.  My thinking is it’s the busy summer months and World Showcase could get really crowded with the extra booths and the heavy crowds that come into the parks.  But also over the past few years, I have been able to attend all four of the EPCOT Festivals.  How do I rank them?

1) Festival of the Holidays

The 2018 Festival of the Holidays took place from November 18 to December 30.  It is a wonderful celebration of the holidays from around the world.  Each pavilion tells the story of Christmas from its country’s perspective.  The food booths are just as good, if not better, than the booths during the Food and Wine Festival.  Guests can go celebrate Christmas around the world while enjoying some good food along the way.  Plus, there is a Christmas Cookie Trail!  Guest can go from booth to booth and sample Christmas cookies and their reward for eating all the cookies is a special bonus cookie!  A nice addition which brightens the holidays at EPCOT.

2) Flower and Garden Festival

I love spring-time and the Flower and Garden Festival plays right into this love of spring.  I’m not if it’s a love of spring or more of a hatred of winter and snow.  Spring gives me a chance to go back outside and not have the air hurt my face.  EPCOT goes all out with gorgeous topiaries  throughout the park.  They try to create topiaries of all the popular Disney characters from old favorites to new characters on the scene.  It’s a great opportunity to get outside and enjoy the warmth of the sun, see some fantastic garden creations while enjoying some good food along the way.

3) Festival of the Arts

The newest festival to the EPCOT scene fills the space between the Festival of the Holidays and the Flower and Garden Festival.  I attended this festival, briefly, when I was down to umpire the Disney Field Hockey Showcase in early February.  The other downside, I only attended the festival at night and hobbling around on a hurt knee.  So, my ranking may reflect those issues.  But, it still has a lot to see and do.  There are a lot of interactive art exhibits where you can let out your own artistic talents.  There are shows every night at the America Gardens Theatre for guests to enjoy and there is plenty of Disney artwork for purchase as well.

4) Food and Wine Festival

Wait, EPCOT’s most popular festival is ranked last?!?!?!  Yes.  While Food and Wine is the most popular and longest running festival but those features are its major drawbacks.  The food, in my opinion, is not as good as at the other festivals because the food booths have to handle a lot more people.  When you have to serve more people, it’s only natural for the food quality to go down.

There are too many choices.  It takes many visits to EPCOT and at the right time to sample all of the booths because there are so many booths to visit.  Add in the number of people and it’s hard to visit all the booths.

There are too many people.  The Food and Wine Festival has become a victim of its own popularity.  The World Showcase becomes very crowded at night and on the weekends as the Central Florida locals come to enjoy the festival in addition to the typical park guest.  At times, the World Showcase can become unwalkable.  There are times where you can still enjoy the festival relatively free of crowds but those time windows are becoming fewer and smaller.

The Food and Wine Festival is a good festival but in comparison to the “smaller” and more themed festivals, it falls to fourth on the list.

Looking to go down to Walt Disney World and partake in any of these EPCOT Festivals?  Contact the operator of DadForDisney at Fairytale Journeys by Tim Brooks (timtravels92@gmail.com).  A Disney vacation is a big event and Fairytale Journeys by Tim Brooks is with you every step of the way from choosing a resort to booking dining reservations to planning your days in the park.