Inaugural Epcot International Festival of the Arts

[WannaBeImagineer 98]

6 hours ago, Tri-Circle-D said:

I was against these added festivals, but I liked what they did for the Christmas holiday, and I like this one too!

I hope that you will be able to make it to one.

TCD

Well it looks like I'm going to make it to one of the original Festivals!  I just used my miles to book flights to go in May!  

We haven't been since November 2015 so we are ready and with all the new advertising that Disney is doing W is asking about it all the time.

Not to mention we have to make our first trip as a family of four, W now has a baby sister!

WBI

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

15 hours ago, WannaBeImagineer said:

Well it looks like I'm going to make it to one of the original Festivals!  I just used my miles to book flights to go in May!  

We haven't been since November 2015 so we are ready and with all the new advertising that Disney is doing W is asking about it all the time.

Not to mention we have to make our first trip as a family of four, W now has a baby sister!

WBI

CONGRATULATIONS!

I knew that there was a new little WBI on the way, but I didn't know that she had arrived, or that there's another princess in the WBI gang.  That's perfect!

I'm glad to hear y'all will finally be back in May.  I guess since you're flying it won't be a Fort stay. 

TCD

[WannaBeImagineer 98]

1 hour ago, Tri-Circle-D said:

CONGRATULATIONS!

I knew that there was a new little WBI on the way, but I didn't know that she had arrived, or that there's another princess in the WBI gang.  That's perfect!

I'm glad to hear y'all will finally be back in May.  I guess since you're flying it won't be a Fort stay. 

TCD

Thank you!

We didn't know what we were having this go around, I was sure it was a girl and CP was sure it was a boy, she was shocked it was a girl and kept saying that for days.  Oh and she hasn't been here very long, she's only 16 days old.

You are correct no Fort stay this time, we are doing Grayton Beach State Park for spring break and taking our camper to my sister in Mississippi in March, so I figured that was enough camper trips on I10 for me for a while.  The thought of having to drive across I10 in Louisiana that many times with the camper in such a short time frame was not appealing to me. lol   Plus I was able to snag some "free" tickets to fly so it worked out.  

We haven't booked a resort yet but it will either be Riverside or we splurge on a "cheaper" deluxe.

Our biggest adjustment will be having to pay for W, he now requires a ticket to get into the parks, and if we do 'O'h'a'n'a or a buffet they are going to charge us!  Talk about sticker shock since we're used to just the two of us.

WBI

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

14 minutes ago, WannaBeImagineer said:

 'O'h'a'n'a .

WBI

LOL. Nice apostrophe work!

I feel your pain about paying Disney prices for little kids.  It's a real game changer.

Why do you think we eat so many GAG's?

Oh, and not to scare you, but your fun is just starting.  Wait until those kids are teenagers!

But it's all good!

Have a great time at Grayton Beach.  I assume you know that the new Seagrove Market has opened?  I've been scheming of a way to get there.

TCD

[WannaBeImagineer 98]

53 minutes ago, Tri-Circle-D said:

LOL. Nice apostrophe work!

I feel your pain about paying Disney prices for little kids.  It's a real game changer.

Why do you think we eat so many GAG's?

Oh, and not to scare you, but your fun is just starting.  Wait until those kids are teenagers!

But it's all good!

Have a great time at Grayton Beach.  I assume you know that the new Seagrove Market has opened?  I've been scheming of a way to get there.

TCD

haha thanks!

Yeah I'm already scared of the teenage years, but they'll be fun too.

I did see the grand opening of Seagrove Market Cafe, as we discussed it will never be the same but I'm looking forward to trying it.  It is odd though how they built the front wall away from the building, that makes me think they could tear down that wall at anytime and change the building to make it part of their fancy condos complex on the corner.   But who knows.

WBI

[momof3kids-Yvonne 594]

Well it looks like I'm going to make it to one of the original Festivals!  I just used my miles to book flights to go in May!  

We haven't been since November 2015 so we are ready and with all the new advertising that Disney is doing W is asking about it all the time.

Not to mention we have to make our first trip as a family of four, W now has a baby sister!

WBI

Congratulations! I do believe the new princess deserves her own thread with photos of course.

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

[GaDawgFan.....Kelly 799]

11 hours ago, WannaBeImagineer said:

Thank you!

We didn't know what we were having this go around, I was sure it was a girl and CP was sure it was a boy, she was shocked it was a girl and kept saying that for days.  Oh and she hasn't been here very long, she's only 16 days old.

You are correct no Fort stay this time, we are doing Grayton Beach State Park for spring break and taking our camper to my sister in Mississippi in March, so I figured that was enough camper trips on I10 for me for a while.  The thought of having to drive across I10 in Louisiana that many times with the camper in such a short time frame was not appealing to me. lol   Plus I was able to snag some "free" tickets to fly so it worked out.  

We haven't booked a resort yet but it will either be Riverside or we splurge on a "cheaper" deluxe.

Our biggest adjustment will be having to pay for W, he now requires a ticket to get into the parks, and if we do 'O'h'a'n'a or a buffet they are going to charge us!  Talk about sticker shock since we're used to just the two of us.

WBI

I remember the first trip when Z needed a ticket. Ouch! 

[Friend of a Fiend ... Pam 8]

Thanks for the report! Kelly and I will be there in a couple of weeks. She has been so excited about the festival, but I hadn't caught the bug. She was able to snag tickets for the show. Now, you have me excited to see this new festival and the show. To me, Food & Wine just wasn't worth the expense of going booth to booth, and I didn't really experience any gastronomic wonders there. But, that may just be me. 

It's always a pleasure to read your trip reports! Keep 'em coming.

[Travisma 1,317]

9 hours ago, Friend of a Fiend ... Pam said:

Thanks for the report! Kelly and I will be there in a couple of weeks. She has been so excited about the festival, but I hadn't caught the bug. She was able to snag tickets for the show. Now, you have me excited to see this new festival and the show. To me, Food & Wine just wasn't worth the expense of going booth to booth, and I didn't really experience any gastronomic wonders there. But, that may just be me. 

It's always a pleasure to read your trip reports! Keep 'em coming.

Maybe we were just lucky, but to us the Art Festival was a lot less crowded and way more enjoyable than the other festivals EPCOT offers.  You can see the majority of the art that the booths offer without having to go into them.  Then if something catches your eye you can take the time to look closer.

We didn't get any food, but there were quite a few that sounded good.  I'm basically cheap, and even though Food and Wine has good food I hate spending the $$ for just an appetizer portion, though others have posted that the portions for the Art festival seem larger.

Overall there seemed to be a lot less wandering groups of drunks.

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

1 hour ago, Travisma said:

Maybe we were just lucky, but to us the Art Festival was a lot less crowded and way more enjoyable than the other festivals EPCOT offers.  You can see the majority of the art that the booths offer without having to go into them.  Then if something catches your eye you can take the time to look closer.

We didn't get any food, but there were quite a few that sounded good.  I'm basically cheap, and even though Food and Wine has good food I hate spending the $$ for just an appetizer portion, though others have posted that the portions for the Art festival seem larger.

Overall there seemed to be a lot less wandering groups of drunks.

I agree with you- the atmosphere at the Festival of the Arts is much calmer than at Food and Wine Festival weekends.

I attribute it to the fact that it's a new event, and wasn't announced very far in advance.  Nobody really had time to plan for it.

And Broadway performers apparently attract a different demographic than washed-up pop music performers.

Also, the price points for the special food and drink offerings make it less attractive to stopping at every booth for something to eat or drink.

It reminds me of the early years of the Food and Wine Festival- it wasn't anywhere near as crazy as it is now.

It's too bad there are only two weekends left for the Festival of the Arts.

TCD

[ceemike...Mike & Judy 50]

Thanks for the trip report. We went to the festival on Monday, sunny and cool and uncrowded, a great day for walking around the World Showcase. We finally bought the David Doss print Fun at Fort Wilderness, and got it signed by the artist.

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[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

11 minutes ago, ceemike...Mike & Judy said:

 

Thanks for the trip report. We went to the festival on Monday, sunny and cool and uncrowded, a great day for walking around the World Showcase. We finally bought the David Doss print Fun at Fort Wilderness, and got it signed by the artist.

 

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

Very cool!

Congratulations on getting your print signed.

I love walking around the World Showcase when it's cool out and not crowded.  There's not too many times you can do that during the other Festivals.

TCD

[GaDawgFan.....Kelly 799]

On 1/30/2017 at 9:51 PM, Friend of a Fiend ... Pam said:

Thanks for the report! Kelly and I will be there in a couple of weeks. She has been so excited about the festival, but I hadn't caught the bug. She was able to snag tickets for the show. Now, you have me excited to see this new festival and the show. To me, Food & Wine just wasn't worth the expense of going booth to booth, and I didn't really experience any gastronomic wonders there. But, that may just be me. 

It's always a pleasure to read your trip reports! Keep 'em coming.

I'm going to pretend you didn't say that about Food and Wine, so we can still be friends. And we're eating at some of these booths! I will show you the way, grasshopper. 

8 hours ago, ceemike...Mike & Judy said:

 

Thanks for the trip report. We went to the festival on Monday, sunny and cool and uncrowded, a great day for walking around the World Showcase. We finally bought the David Doss print Fun at Fort Wilderness, and got it signed by the artist.

 

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

I'm jealous! 

[Travisma 1,317]

14 hours ago, GaDawgFan.....Kelly said:

I'm going to pretend you didn't say that about Food and Wine, so we can still be friends. And we're eating at some of these booths! I will show you the way, grasshopper. 

I'm jealous! 

Just empty your bank account before arriving.

[Friend of a Fiend ... Pam 8]

Good luck, lady! I'm happy to walk around with you while you spend all your money. 

Wouldn't you rather just find a good restaurant and be waited on?

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

The TCD gang paid one more visit to the International Festival of the Arts on Saturday, February 11th. 

It was just a day trip again.

This time, the oldest TCD DD was going to meet up with me there in the early afternoon, and Twin #1 was going to swoop in just for the Broadway part.  Twin #2 was working, but only until 8 pm, and we planned to meet up for a late dinner.

I arrived at Epcot a bit early for the time I was going to meet my daughter.  This was the opening weekend for the Florida State Fair near Tampa, and I had to drive past it, so I allowed extra time for traffic.  Fortunately, I didn't need the extra time, and there were no delays.  I also got a primo parking spot right on the end of the row closet to the tram stop, and zipped right in to the park.  Even though they're making everyone pass through a metal detector at the bag check area, that didn't take long either. I also got to use the passholder entrance, and I was in:

We have been having some super nice weather in Central Florida this winter.  Look at the blue sky:

Since I had some time to kill before my DD showed up, I popped in to the Fountain View beverage store to see if my boycott had put them out of business yet.  Not yet:

When I was in the Fountain View, I heard some singers performing out on the stage in front of the fountain. When I got there, the singers were gone, and the "Living Statues" were out. 

There was a silver guy closest to me.  He was supposed to represent "Space":

In all honesty, that guy in he Mickey Mouse t-shirt who photobombed me is more interesting to look at than the silver guy.

But these guests liked him:

There are little artist displays all around Epcot for these weekends, and many of them have an artist on hand.  Here's one, but the artist must have been on break:

I checked my times guide and saw that there was going to be a free photography presentation given by a Disney photographer over at the Odyssey Center.  I headed over there, and got a seat:

The speaker was great.  Very funny and unpretentious.  He showed a bunch of his photos, told us the story behind them, and shared some amusing anecdotes.  Then he showed us how they take a raw photo and edit it.  He started with a very basic photo of Expedition Everest, then, using Lightroom and Photoshop, changed the sky, added mist, cleaned up the tracks, and even added some mountains in the background to come up with the final product:

It made me think of some of the ridiculous Fort Wilderness photos we have seen over the past few years with beautiful campsites that don't exist.

I enjoyed the seminar.  And it was free.  There was one later in the day for glass blowing.  I didn't make it back for that one.

After the seminar, I checked out the Hebert Ryman gallery.  We looked at this the first time we came, but I enjoyed it, and wanted to see it again.

Herb is a Disney legend who worked closely with Walt in planning and envisioning Disneyland, and later, EPCOT:

This is one of Herb's paintings, from 1981, showing Spaceship Earth and the Epcot entry plaza before it was even built:

This is the Horizons pavilion, which was later torn down and replaced by Mission Space:

This painting is cool- it is from 1966 and shows Walt's original concept of the Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow:

This drawing confused me a bit- the sign next to it says it shows an early concept of having a golden dome in the Epcot entry area instead of a geodesic sphere.  It still looks like a giant golf ball to me:

Here's a drawing of a pavilion that still exists- the Land:

And this one is from World of Motion, which was torn down and replaced by Test Track:

After my look at the gallery, it was time to go and meet my daughter. We were going to meet by the golf ball.  I stopped behind it to check out the Figment topiary:

I sat off to the side near the entrance to Innoventions, which is now closed.  I watched as a family interacted with a friendly squirrel:

As people walked by, they stopped to see what was going on:

Before long, a small mob was gathered:

Imagine that.  These folks are paying $100+ a day to visit this park, and they're all stopping to look and take photos of a squirrel?

I will hand it to the squirrel- he knew how to work a crowd.  He got several bits of food fed to him:

People were hand-feeding the squirrel.  I kept waiting for someone to get bit.  But, it didn't happen.  Instead, everyone got bored and left.  Except this girl:

It was time for me to go meet my daughter, and that's what I did next.

I'll pick it up from there in the next (and final) update.

TCD

[Travisma 1,317]

As Doug  Dug  would say "SQUIRREL !"

[Helmsey......Todd 134]

12 minutes ago, Tri-Circle-D said:

 

The speaker was great.  Very funny and unpretentious.  He showed a bunch of his photos, told us the story behind them, and shared some amusing anecdotes.  Then he showed us how they take a raw photo and edit it.  He started with a very basic photo of Expedition Everest, then, using Lightroom and Photoshop, changed the sky, added mist, cleaned up the tracks, and even added some mountains in the background to come up with the final product:

 

TCD

 

That cup in the bottom right of this shot must belong to someone else, OR that boycott thing isn't working all that well 

[DaveInTN 3,247]

I'll admit I'm not the most cultured person in the world, but this festival seems like a great place to go for someone having trouble sleeping.  

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

1 hour ago, Travisma said:

As Doug would say "SQUIRREL !"

LOL!

**Dug

57 minutes ago, Helmsey......Todd said:

That cup in the bottom right of this shot must belong to someone else, OR that boycott thing isn't working all that well 

Ha!

That's a cup of free ice water.

That's even better than a boycott.  They hand that out for free.  So, I'm costing them money. That's what they get for worshiping a satanic mermaid and taking away Main Street Bakery Cinnamon Rolls.

40 minutes ago, DaveInTN said:

I'll admit I'm not the most cultured person in the world, but this festival seems like a great place to go for someone having trouble sleeping.  

What are you talking about?

Didn't you see they had an actual squirrel there?  Guests love that!

TCD

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

I met up with DD in front of the big golf ball.  It was a great day.  I know that there are parts of the country getting slammed with bad weather, but here in Florida it was sunny and in the upper 70's.

Our first stop was going to be the giant paint by numbers mural.  She hadn't gotten to do that yet.

On the way there, we saw a girl wearing a neon green wig for no apparent reason.  I took her photo so I could study it later back at TCD HQ to figure out what this was all about. As near as I can tell, it was just a girl in a green wig:

We walked past the Living Statues.  Yikes, it looks like C3P0 was going on break, and he was walking right toward us with his eyes closed:

One more thing about that photo- what is going on on that guy next to C3P0's t-shirt?  Is that supposed to be a Hidden Mickey slice of pizza?  I don't get it.

I thought they kept painting the same paint by numbers mural every week.  Well, they don't.  This week, it was a depiction of World Showcase pavilions:

It wasn't even 3 o'clock yet, and it was almost done:

I painted my squares:

Actually, I think I painted the wrong numbers for my paint color.  I didn't notice until I checked the lid on my paint container, and saw it was a different number from what I thought the CM told me to paint when he handed me the paint and brush.  So, if that mural ends up looking funny, that's my bad.  Sorry. Like Mrs. TCD always says- you can't take me anywhere.

After the paint by numbers, we headed back to the Odyssey center so DD could see the displays there.  And, we partook in another round of the savory croissant donuts and got a Neapolitan beer flight:

I had tried the strawberry beer with the twins the first time we came here.  None of us could detect a strawberry flavor.  The vanilla beer had a definite scent and taste of vanilla, but I'll be darned if I tasted more than a very slight hint of chocolate or strawberry in the other two.  I should have had a V8.

(p.s. for anyone who doubted I got ice water from Starbucks, you can see that H20 is written on my cup in the background of the beer photo.  This is awkward.  Now you need to apologize.)

From here, we headed around the World Showcase.  We didn't have reserved seats for the Broadway performance, and I wanted to get to the theater an hour or so before the show to see what the standby line looked like.

As we walked around, we stopped and enjoyed some of the chalk artists who were at work.  Granted, it's not as exciting as feeding a rabid squirrel bits of popcorn, but it's not something you see every day:

We got to the stage at the American Adventure about an hour before show time, and saw that there were only about 20-30 guests lined up.  The standby area was in the direct sun, and it was probably a little above 80 degrees.  It wouldn't have been life threatening to stand in that line, but we clearly didn't need to, so we decided to head in to the American Adventure and wait in the nice air conditioning.

As we approached the building, we saw that they had a slew of characters in the area to the left as you face the building.  This is training for new character performers, and it's never on the schedule.  You have to luck into it. And we did.  Way in the back, Mickey and Minnie were meeting together, and no one was back there to meet them.  So we did:

That's a major accomplishment these days. The only place you can meet those mice as a pair is in the Animal Kingdom.  And you're going to have much more of a wait than we did to meet them there.

After that, we headed in to the American Adventure.  The Voices of Liberty were performing.  That was awesome timing.

While we were chilling in there, we heard from Twin #1 that she and a friend were heading over from the MK via a Boardwalk bus, and they would meet us at the theater.

We headed out and were able to walk right in to the theater and choose our seats.  We ended up in the section next to the reserved passholder seating area (which never did fill up).

This was our view of the stage:

I liked how I could see the lake and giant golf ball over to the side:

These two ladies in yellow dresses had some kind of special reserved seating up front.  I don't know who gets that.  And I don't know what was up with the yellow dresses either:

The show started right on time.  This weekend (and next) the performers were Kissy Simmons and Alton Fitzgerald White.  Both are performed on Broadway in the Lion King. Naturally, they opened with Hakuna Matada:

One neat thing about these performances is that the performers share personal stories in between the songs. Kissy told us that she was born and raised in an area about an hour and a half from WDW and that her real name is Kissimmee.  She played Nala in the Lion King, and was a great performer.  Alton told us that he had performed the role of Mufasa in the Lion King over 5,000.  Times.  Do the math. That's mind boggling.

Hey, look up there- there are actual men operating the spotlights:

You'd think this is something that could be automated.

There's Alton:

They then sang a song from Aladdin, and next two from the play Aida.  I don't know anything about this play, but it was written by Elton John and Tim Rice, right after they hit it big with Lion King.  It's about an Egyptian princess or something:

 I think it would have been a smarter move to sing some songs that the audience would know, but some people seemed to like the two Aida songs. 

They finished the show with a Little Mermaid song.  We lucked out and there was no Frozen music in this performance:

It ended up that we didn't enjoy these two as much as we did the performers from the first weekend we went.  But, they were both very good, and it was great for a free show.

Afterward, we ran into the same people gridlock we did the last time.  But, it didn't last long:

After this, we headed all the way around the World Showcase.  We stopped at Canada and tried the mushroom risotto that they are serving at the booth there for this festival. We had heard several reports that it was good.  And it was.  

Then Twin #1 took off to meet up with some friends, and big sister and I rode Soarin' with a FP I had made for us.  DD agreed with the rest of us that the original Soarin' is better than the new CGI Soarin'.  It's too bad Disney goofed on this.

Once again, we chose to get out of the park before Illuminations and the inevitable mob that would all be leaving at the same time afterward.  Twin #2 wanted to meet up at the Buffalo Wild Wings in the Crossroads Plaza.  She has heard the rumors that it's closing, and she and Twin #1 used to go there a lot during their DCP programs.  So, that's where we met up for dinner.  I had to drive past Disney Springs to get there, and it was an absolute zoo.  Both parking garages were full and only surface parking was available.  Yikes.  I had never seen that before.

It looked like every place at the Crossroads was packed too.  I'll bet Disney is licking its chops at the prospect of that many restaurants closing. 

We had a nice dinner, and the girls headed back to their local apartments.

I headed home. 

There has been some talk about returning to WDW next weekend since it's the official Rivers of Light premier.  We'll see about that.

TCD

 

 

 

[Ivy 36]

Thanks TCD! I always enjoy reading about your trips.

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

In case anyone is contemplating attending the Festival of the Arts next year, here's a link to a report from Josh at easywdw which does a really good job giving an overview of the Festival:

http://www.easywdw.com/easy/blog/epcot-festival-of-the-arts-review/

TCD

[Travisma 1,317]

Overall we enjoyed the festival.  It seemed a lot calmer and easier to navigate than the Garden and F&W.

I was surprised on the amount of Disney themed art and character paintings since Disney likes to go after places/people that copy their characters.

I'm guessing that they are somehow licensed by Disney to make and sell their various items.

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

5 minutes ago, Travisma said:

I'm guessing that they are somehow licensed by Disney to make and sell their various items.

That's a good question you're raising.  There must be some kind of financial agreement between Disney and these artists.  There's no way that Disney is going to let someone like David Doss, to give one example, keep all of the money he makes from artwork depicting Disney's Intellectual Property. 

TCD