The International Festival of Arts is the 1st festival each year at EPCOT. And we are headed to there today with our daughter to check it out. Follow along as we experience what the EPCOT International Festival of Arts has to offer and more.
Planning the International Festival of Arts
There are 3 festivals each year at EPCOT, but the International Festival of Arts is the most colorful. Each festival has food stations and entertainment, but this festival is about the arts. Not only is the food more colorful, but there are so many art-related things to do around the park. Our plan is to sample from the food stations throughout to day saving room for dinner. We also plan to check out many of the festival activities along the way. To read more about it, see: EPCOT International Festival of the Arts | Walt Disney World Resort
The great thing about being an annual passholder is we don’t have to do everything in one day. And we go enough we learn from our past experiences. Our last “rope drop” experience did not work out so well. You can read more about it here: First Times & MagicBand+ At Hollywood Studios. So our plan today is to get a little more sleep and get to the park about 10:00AM. Then we’ll enjoy the Festival of Arts throughout the day until our dinner reservation at Space 220. The other thing we want to do is continue our Fab 50 Quest to find the 6 golden statues at EPCOT. And pickup our latest passholder magnet. But today is all about the International Festival of Arts.
International Festival of Arts Passport
We arrive at the park around 10:00AM and get preferred parking since it’s likely to rain. And as soon as we get through the gates, we grab our Festival Passport. This little book lists all of the festival activities and food stations. And it includes all of the food station menus.
In the back of the book is the Wonderful Walk of Colorful Cuisine. 7 colorful food station items are highlighted here. And as so you go to the different food stations, if you buy one of these items you get a passport stamp. Get of 5 of the 7 stamps on the last page in your passport and you can redeem for a festival treat. That sounds like a fun way to try out the food stations, so that’ll be part of the plan.
Characters and “Figment ride”
The other thing we see entering the park are lines to see Goofy and Minnie. We had heard there are more character greetings this year and glad to see them. But instead of stopping, we get some photos before deciding to ride Journey into Imagination with Figment. Walking to the ride we see Winnie the Pooh waving to some guests. But we continue to this classic ride with a posted 5 minute wait. And we walk right on in 2 minutes.
After the ride we see a sign pointing to Mickey Mouse. So, we head next door to the Disney & Pixar Short Film Festival Theater. Inside we see a short line to meet Mickey that we can’t refuse. So, we stop for some more pictures and hugs with Mickey. But now we are ready to experience the International Festival of Arts. So we decide to head to Figment’s Inspiration Station at the Odyssey on the other side.
On the way, we spot our 1st chalk character. It’s Mickey with his Fantasia outfit and it looks like he is magically making the water move up the fountain. We’re excited to have seen so many characters so far, but we’re ready to experience some food. On the way we pass a blank canvas that we’ll check out later.
Figment’s Inspiration Station at the Odyssey
Figment’s Inspiration Station is located in the Odyssey building which has been many different things in the past. But today they have a Figment popcorn bucket with rainbow popcorn! We had heard these popcorn buckets sold out quickly last year, but today there are plenty of them. Besides the popcorn, the other items are mostly desserts, but we order a few while we’re here
The menu is full of colorful choices including the Pop’t Art, a sugar cookie with blueberry filling. And it’s one of the Wonderful Walk of Colorful Cuisine items, so we get a passport stamp. We get a grape smoothie with freeze dried Skittles for our daughter and a rainbow beer flight for Becky. But after we get our items, we have a hard time finding a place to sit. Not only is the food station here, but there are art displays and we see a line to meet an artist. However, we ask to share a table with another couple, and put our items down on our half.
The rainbow popcorn comes in a pre-sealed bag in the back of the Figment shaped bucket. We open it up and pour in the sweet popcorn. The grape smoothie is also very sweet. In fact it tastes like a grape Skittle in a cute plastic Figment glass. It’s too much for our daughter though, so she shares with us. But a few sips is enough for everyone. And the colorful beers are just okay and not really our style. But the Pop’t Art is a tasty cookie, much better than that toaster pastry. Dessert first sounds like a good idea, and it wasn’t planned, but I’m ready for some real food.
More Food, Painting and More Art
Near Test Track, I stop at the Moderne food station for some pan seared scallops. Not only are they good, but they’re also one of the items to get a stamp. Though not as colorful as the last item, we now have 2 of the 5 stamps needed. And after our 1st round of food we are ready to paint. At the Expression Section: A Paint by Numbers Mural booth, we pick up paint, brushes, and our assigned numbers.
The blank canvas we passed earlier is a massive mural where we can paint up to 6 squares. We get 2 paint colors, black and blue, with a number on each. So we paint some squares with numbers that match our colors. As the wall fills with color it will eventually reveal a beautiful mural. When done, we get copy of what it will look like afterwards: A Starry Night at EPCOT.
After leaving the mural, we pass on the other side of the fountain to see another chalk character. It’s the mop from Fantasia catching the water. It’s pretty clever and nicely drawn. Just past we see the Drawing on Inspiration: Celebrating 50 Years of Magic wall. Here we see incredible depictions of EPCOT attractions illustrated by Disney Imagineers. But after the art break, we’re ready for round 2 of food.
More International Festival of Arts Food Stations
While I wait in line for the Pop Eats! food station, Becky heads to Refreshment Port around the corner for poutine. Refreshment Port near Canada offers delicious poutine year round. But today they offer a festival version of gnocchi poutine with red wine-braised beef, cheese curds, basil and burrata.
It definitely sounds interesting, but I’m more interested in Pop Eats! Since our daughter hasn’t eaten much other than sweets, I get her the tomato soup with grilled cheese. I also get a tomato soup with pimento cheese, bacon and fried green tomato grilled cheese. And since their almond frangipane cake is another stamp item, we order another dessert. We’ll eat with the bottles of water we brought.
I find an open table to put our food on and Becky meets us with the poutine. The gnocchi in the poutine is fried which we’ve never had. It’s an inventive dish with plenty of beef, some cheese curds and a little burrata. It’s ok, but would be so much better with their normal french fries. As for the tomato soup, it’s a winner with our daughter. She loves soup, and both grilled cheeses are tasty. The almond cake is good though the raspberry jam layered in is not much. And it just has chocolate sauce on the outside. It’s colorful, but not the best. So we try one more dessert at Deco Delights.
Deco Delights
The Deco Delights food station is just a short walk away and has another dessert for a stamp. So, we decide to get the orange mousse with lemon cake and raspberry meringues. But the real draw here is the Neapolitan beer flight. It comes with a strawberry blonde nitro, a vanilla porter and a chocolate milk stout. And we both get our own.
The beers from local Florida micro-breweries are all tasty and I really like the vanilla porter. But the orange mousse like the almond cake, is colorful but kind of weird. It comes with a little orange mouse dessert in the middle of the plate with a candied orange peel. It’s accompanied with 2 meringues that lack flavor and the lemon cake is just ok. However the orange mousse is delicious and now we only need 1 more stamp to come back here for our treat. 4 of the 7 stamps needed for the Wonderful Walk of Colorful Cuisine are desserts, and we’ve had 3. But rather than get the last one, we take another break from food.
Fab 50 Quest and More Art
We started our Fab 50 Quest a couple weeks ago at Hollywood Studios and Animal Kingdom. And we were able to “collect” all of the statues on the Play Disney parks app with our MagicBand+. And there are 6 more statues at EPCOT with 9 total characters. Just past Deco Delights we see our first one, Olaf from Frozen. He actually shares the statue with the fire lizard Bruni from Frozen II. And we collect them with a wave of our hand which also makes Olaf talk.
Also in the same area we passed Heihei and Pua from Moana. After collecting them we head to the other side where we see Rocket Raccoon and baby Groot. They remind us that the 2nd virtual queue for Cosmic Rewind, the new Guardians of the Galaxy opens at 1:00PM. So, we get our phones ready to punch them right at 1:00. To read everything about this ride, check out our separate post: Cosmic Rewind, The New Guardians Ride At EPCOT. We are able to get in the queue with an estimated return of 240 minutes. So, we take our time to collect the rest of the Fab 50 characters.
After Rocket and Groot, we see Miguel and Dante from the movie Coco. However, they each have their own golden statue. And now we have to find 1 more statue, our favorite Figment. But he is a little farther away on the bridge toward World Celebration. Our quest is now complete at EPCOT, but we have Magic Kingdom tomorrow.
Kid’s Chalk Art and Artful Photo Ops
Right behind the Figment statue is an area called Kid’s Chalk Art. Here kids can create their very own chalk-art masterpiece. So our daughter has to do it. This is another art experience offered during the festival 11:00 AM to 5:00 PM daily. So we sit and let our daughter draw for about 15 minutes.
Across from Kid’s Chart Art are some Artful Photo Ops, or famous paintings where you become a part of them. Becky heads to the restroom while I take our daughter across for some fun. We heard Disney PhotoPass photographers would be on hand to take photos, but there is none around. So, we take turns being a part of the famous paintings including Van Gogh’s Cafe Terrace at Night and Sunflowers.
We take a couple of pictures of each other and I must say our daughter is a pretty good little photographer. After some picture fun, we meet back up with Becky. Our daughter wants to go to France, so we head to the ferry that leaves for Morocco.
Encanto Cocina Food Station and France
The ferry boats leave every 15 minutes but we see the boat boarding so we run to it. And it lets us off near the Vibranta & Vivido: Encanto Cocina food station. And this Encanto-inspired station has 1 of the Wonderful Walk of Colorful Cuisine offerings that is not a dessert. They have a chorizo and potato empanada which sounds good so we get one to get our 5th stamp. And we order a coconut and passion fruit smoothie for our daughter. It’s a nice way to cool off and the empanada is tasty. And we now have all the stamps we need to get our festival treat later.
Now we want to head to France to ride: Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure Now At EPCOT. Unfortunately this ride no longer has a virtual queue, and the posted wait time is 80 minutes. And we should have gotten a drink before the line. Not to mention after about 20 minutes Becky takes our daughter to the restroom. And when she gets back I’ve barely moved. It actually takes us 95 minutes to get on the ride which is ridiculous, but we still enjoy the ride.
Afterwards, we see Princess Aurora from Sleeping Beauty on the way back. While Becky waits in line with our daughter to meet Aurora, I head to the L’Art de la Cuisine Française food pavilion. I get a black winter truffle croissant for me and a frozen French martini for Becky. I’m not going to lie, I had some of her martini, and I wish I would’ve gotten 2. After meeting Aurora, we meet back up and take some photos before heading to Xandar.
Our International Festival of Arts Treats
By this time, our time for the Guardians of the Galaxy ride has already been called. And we have to rush across the park to get there before our time expires. We skip the ferry walking through the countries back to Deco Delights in the Showcase Pavilion. We show them our stamped passport and they give us a pre-wrapped cookie and a berry smoothie.
The cookie is shaped like a cute artist’s palette. And since it’s pre-wrapped, we save it for later. The berry smoothie is a nice extra treat we weren’t expecting. And it came in a different Festival of Arts plastic glass. We share the smoothie on the way to the Xandar pavilion.
Guardians Line and Space 220 Dinner
We rush to Xandar to get in line a few minutes before our queue time expires at 4:45PM. We wait 30 minutes in line until our daughter has to use the restroom. So we exit, but they let us back in through the lightning lane line. But by the time it is 5:25PM, and it still takes us 35 minutes to get on the ride. So another ride over an hour, but it was our fault this time. Needless to say, we rush again to get to dinner before our reservation.
I’ve been wanting to get into Space 220 Restaurant ever since I heard about it in 2019. The opening was delayed to winter of 2020, and then the pandemic hit when it was put on hold. But it eventually opened in September 2021, though we haven’t been able to get a reservation until this trip. But this restaurant was worth the wait and is truly out of this world. It’s too much to write about here. But, check out our next post for all the details: Space 220 Restaurant is in “Real, Real Space”.
International Festival of Arts Summary
EPCOT’s International Festival of Arts is a colorful and fun experience. And we spent the day exploring the art and food stations around the park. We actually only went to 6 of the 16 food stations, but enough to get our 5 stamps. With our stamps, we completed the Wonderful Walk of Colorful Cuisine and received some festival treats. Not to mention we had some really colorful food and drinks and enjoyed trying different things. But it wasn’t just the food, we got to experience the art. We got to paint part of a mural, saw and did some chalk art, and became part of a painting. And luckily it didn’t rain more than a sprinkle today.
We enjoyed the International Festival of Arts so much, we only rode 3 rides today. But Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure and Cosmic Rewind are the 2 newest rides in EPCOT, though the lines were long. We also completed our Fab 50 Quest at this park and look forward to completing it tomorrow at Magic Kingdom!
Sounds like you guys had fun! I love the immersive paintings!!