When planning my trip to Orlando this season, one of the most difficult things was deciding on which parks we were going to go to. Deciding between Epcot and Animal Kingdom was a struggle up until the day we got the tickets, because deciding to skip Pandora was quite hard for us. But, we did it and I couldn’t be happier!
The first thing I have to say is if you are planning to go to Epcot over the next few months make sure you stay till the end of the night, the show is amazing, they have one of, if not the best fireworks display I have seen in my life, all while having a large globe spinning in the water with projections from around the world displayed across the continents. Apparently they are doing away with this to make way for a more Disney character themed show, which is a shame, all the parks are great but this one is definitely the one that is a bit more for the adults, and its a shame to get rid of something that is both, fun and educational just to add in more characters, don’t get me wrong I love them, but it can be a little much after a day at Magic Kingdom it’s kind of nice to have a bit of a break.
Now on to the festivities, they had a live band directly behind the Epcot “Globe” aka golf ball, that played Christmas music till about 6 pm, and there was Disney Christmas music that was played all throughout the park til close, once we entered the around the world section, each country had a musical performer playing holiday music from their country. They also had a stand in each section that had traditional holiday food and drinks, we didn’t try many of these due the fact that I am a very picky eater. I do have one major tip for how you navigate through the circle, based on your food sensitivities, if you are like me and are quite picky, meaning you mainly eat, Mexican, Italian, and American foods you are going to want to start the circle by going left, we made the mistake of going right and didn’t find anything we were remotely interesting in and ended up hitting American food first and were starving, so we ate American which is not what you want in a place like this, luckily by the time we hit Mexico, we had been walking so much we found room and ate again, it was so good, I recommend the margarita’s, it was one of the best I’ve ever had. But, also by doing this we ended up missing out on the pastries in France because we didn’t like the food options, and weren’t ready for dessert yet and by the time we had almost looped back around we were exhausted and gave up. If you are adventurous with your food go right, they have a lot of cool things that I was unfamiliar with so it’s definitely worth the look.
The overall atmosphere from the day the decorations, treats and watching kids run around doing some kind of holiday scavenger hunt, just gave it the most festive feel. Plus, this is where the frozen ride is, which as someone who liked Frozen, but was an adult so wasn’t obsessed, you can take my word, you don’t want to miss it, the ride is fun but the graphics are amazing. The other rides from the day were fun as well though the race car ride from Chevy was probably the best ride from the entire trip, which just shows that Universal really needs to redo that Fast and Furious ride, not good. The other rides in Epcot were a lot of fun as well though we missed Soarin’ it was the only one we didn’t make it to, which is super disappointing because had we made it, we would have actually completed one park, didn’t happen on this one, so we obviously are going to be going back.
I have to say, since we were in Orlando for Christmas I think going with Epcot over Animal Kingdom was the right choice, they had so much to offer, and it was just an amazing day! Check it out, and check it out soon before they take the end of night show away, I will never forget it, so you won’t want to miss out!