Our experience:
Background: our first Epcot MM, but our third since 2018.
DVC & AP holders. Party of 6, with 2 never having attended before.
Because of the strange food wording we decided we needed to get to Epcot earlier than we normal like to for these events. We arrived at 7, had no problem checking in, there was no wait at the front gates. The vouchers say “participating locations”. I asked three CMs at the gate what that meant and no one knew. The fourth said anywhere that takes a snack credit - to look for the symbol. I asked how we could know before walking in which booths do snack credits - no one knew. I grabbed a map and a booklet - neither show which are snack credits. We decided as a group to prioritize my picky eaters - get them fed and we’ll figure out what to use the rest on later! We visited Epcot earlier in the week so had a good idea of what the kids would eat.
Walked into world showcase from the figment side and it was absolute CHAOS. We had to walk single file, there was no seating. Dropped off one adult to get my son two orders of Salmon and we kept walking to find seating or a table. All the booths we passed on the trek had lines past the set up ropes. We hunkered down at the DVC area for some breathing space. I stayed with the two kids and the other two adults walked around the booths through the UK to see if they could grab something yummy (they hadn’t been to Epcot yet so needed to get a handle on the food).Reported back it was too chaotic, so maybe people they could not even read the signs.Took at least 20 minutes for the salmon to come (worth it since it’s the only food my son will eat right now at that park!) and we split up again. Two adults to the encanto cart and my husband to Germany to wait. Frankly we had no problems using the vouchers - might have been luck! We met up with food etc at the bathrooms by Germany and it was exactly 8:54 by the time we had all the food we wanted for everyone. Had to settle a bit because of the crazy but again the priority was the kids so as long as we could get something along with what they would eat - who cares right? To arrive at 7 and basically visit one booth in almost 2 hours is nuts to me. To clarify - we all had to split up - so each adult really only visit one booth. If we had stayed together there was zero chance we could have gotten food.
Fireworks from back there isn’t optimal but we weren’t going to move at this point. That was a pretty stressful two hours. Fireworks finished moments before 9:30 and we went immediately to frozen. Had a big debate on which we should do first to save some walking, decided on frozen then to remy to try to avoid looping all the way around the lake. Note all stores and all booths were closed and boarded up already. I was surprised having never stayed at the park that late before.
Frozen line flew, im starting to forget specifics but I think it was 15 minutes ish. When we got out the line at Kringla was already nuts and the party still hadn’t even started. Tried to head to France and we were stopped and asked to turn the other way. This was one of my big annoyances. We had walked through that path just 15 minutes earlier and there was no indication it was closing. Nothing listed on the MM handout about the park closing either. This was at 9:50. Sucked it up and walked all the way around the opposite way to France since Remy was a priority.
Rode 3 Caballeros when we passed. Saw the evil Queen posing and enormous lines at Disney traders. The two shirts that were being “advertised” by CMs were not MM and easily found at the DVC resorts… so kept walking. My kids were really thirsty as was I. Call me crazy - I know a lot of people on the boards disagree with me but we could not find water. I’m used to having carts with free water and soda at most of the lands - or at least give me somewhere to buy a water bottle. I have never noticed water fountains at Epcot, maybe im blind but it’s pretty dark with all the stores and food closed. We are used to jumping in the QS lines to grab cups of water…
Past several other villains and the popcorn booth line all the way back to the Pooh topiary. Insanity. Remy we waited 25 minutes - excellent! I asked 6 cast members walking from France down to the UK where we could get a bottle of water AND NO ONE KNEW. Again, no carts open, no stores, no booths.
At the still crazy line at the Canadian booth that we were now passing for the second time a CM told us at the only place they knew of was at the imagination pavilion and the line is short there too. Yay!
this was NOT the case. Popcorn and drinks were at the same location and the line was stretched all the way to the construction walls. I’m talking at least 100 people. There is a separate Mickey bar booth there which was appreciated! No wait there! It was now 11:30 and I was getting frustrated. Begged and pleaded and a nice woman let me cut her to get a water bottle for my kids. She’s an angel and im indebted forever. Yes I was that jerk… but I’m not sorry. I didn’t realize until now that water wasn’t free. I must have misread the vouchers. Or maybe I just assumed it was like in the past. It wasn’t a big deal since we had plenty unused ones - but I do think the exchange is what bogged down the lines. I had assumed all these crazy people wanted popcorn. Not the case, for everything you had to line up - at least in the two locations I passed
Rode figment (walk on), Soarin (5 minutes), test track (5 minutes) . Was walking out of test track at 12:54 and there was another popcorn/drink booth over there…. Still chaos line. Unreal!
walked out of the park at 1:05. We had fun! The ride lines were awesome. We did not take any photos with characters bc rides were our priority. As you can see if we had stopped I don’t think we could have ridden everything we wanted. This was not MM of the past.
I don’t see how Disney didn’t foresee these crazy lines, just add a couple drink carts. Or add the tables with water coolers like in years past. Make an executive decision when you see something isn’t working! Put on the map that vouchers are only good where there’s a snack symbol. We had no trouble with vouchers but I can definitely understand the confusion. Tell us you’re closing the back of world show case. I don’t know why they weren’t more transparent- a little more info would have made a world of difference for us
it was the worst one. With better communication my family could have avoided our two biggest frustrations (as follows), but overall yes it is still a free event, and worst doesn’t mean it was bad.
It was the boyfriends first time at Epcot, didn’t leave a good impression. I will say it was free, and that is good, but overall the event was not enjoyable. Not a fun party. Just lots of lines, and 2 rides broken down.
