The Epcot Food and Wine Festival is a Unique, Once a Year Event

“The Epcot Food and Wine Festival is a unique, once a year event, but packed. Don’t even consider it if you don’t like crowds.”

When we went to Disney last year, we had narrowed it down to going either in the beginning October, when the Food and Wine Festival would be happening, or in December when the Christmas Party would be going on.  We had never been to the Food and Wine Festival and Adam had never seen the Christmas decorations, so it was a tough call.  Eventually October won out and we decided that the Food and Wine Festival would be something fun to try.

We were so wrong.  Usually when we hit Disney in the fall it’s pretty empty.  For the first two days of our trip we walked on rides and basically had the parks to ourselves.  And then the Food and Wine Festival started.  Epcot was wall to wall people that first day, I have never seen anything so crowded.  Maelstrom had a wait of 50+ minutes, it was INSANE.  And of course after that first day, all the crowds bled over into every single other park.  It was a miserable, miserable time to be in Disney World.

Added to that, we weren’t really impressed by the Food and Wine Festival.  It was kind of fun to get to see all the kiosks of all the countries that aren’t represented (get a Greece in there, Disney!), but you had to wait in long lines, pay ridiculous prices, and the food was TINY.  Like one or one and a half bites worth!  Half the time the descriptions weren’t accurate, like the time I got a chocolate cake that ended up being covered in coconut, and all in all we just really hated it.  Epcot is usually our favorite park and after that first day we really didn’t bother going back.

And we know in the future to avoid that time of year like the plague!  We were glad we tried it once so we wouldn’t have to wonder, but we’d never do it again.