Our Grown Up Disney Trip {Epcot}

Less than 2 weeks ago, Scott and I spent a long weekend at the happiest place on Earth!! We decided to book a last minute vacation to Disney World and this time we left the kiddos at home. Scott and I had been wanting to get away. We tossed around a few different options but ultimately landed on our very favorite place! We laugh at ourselves because just a few years ago we had never been to Disney and didn't know anything about it. I wanted to take the boys and Scott begrudgingly agreed to it. He went into it with the mindset that he was going to have a miserable time. Low and behold a few years later and it's now our favorite vacation destination. Ha! We've never experienced Disney kid-free so we were so excited about our grown up Disney trip!! We found an awesome deal on a flight and after contacting our Disney travel agent, we had the trip booked .25 seconds later. 

Our flight landed in MCO at 11:30. We packed in a carry-on and had a driver waiting to take us to the hotel so five minutes after we got off the plane, we were on our way! We stayed at the place we always stay, The Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin. We have always stayed on the Dolphin side of the hotel but they temporarily closed it (because of Covid) and had all of the guests stay on the Swan side. The Swan side is just the same as the Dolphin, it's just smaller. But the rooms, amenities, etc area all the same. We checked into our room, put our bags up, then headed to Epcot!

I've written before (HERE) why we love staying at the Swan/Dolphin and one of those reasons is that it's so close to the Boardwalk and to Epcot. We love The Boardwalk! It's such a cool place with great restaurants, activities and shopping. The Boardwalk is never a packed area. It's relatively quiet on any given day. However, it was quite surprising to walk down it with not a single person in sight. We always walk down The Boardwalk to get to Epcot so this was our first taste of what Disney was about to be like and we were so shocked at the emptiness!!! 

At first it made me sad seeing it so empty. Then it made me excited that I was getting to experience Disney like this! It's the whole reason we decided to go to Disney in the first place. We knew the crowds were super low due to Covid and that made it so tempting. I'm on a Disney Facebook group and people were sharing their photos of how empty the parks were and how they were literally walking right onto rides. We knew we would never get to experience it like that again so we decided to take advantage of it! 

The first thing on our agenda once we walked into Epcot was eating and drinking around the world!! The Epcot Food and Wine Festival is going on right now. We've never done it and were excited to experience it! It went above and beyond my expectations!!! The food was incredible and the drinks were perfect! We decided to try small bites + drinks in Canada, Mexico, and Germany, and grabbed more drinks in America and Italy. Everything I had was so, so good and we had so much fun!! It's something we really wouldn't have gotten to experience had the kids been with us. They would have been bored but we had a blast. Ha!! In between our Food and Wine adventure, we popped in and out of rides around Epcot. We hit them all up (even the super kiddie ones!) and we had such a great time. 

One of the things that was so nice about experiencing Epcot with such low crowds is that there was always a table available to sit at. We would walk to a country, grab a drink and a table, enjoy our surroundings, then repeat. It was nice being able to sit after walking so much and the entire day felt chill and relaxing. Normally after a day at Disney I'm tired and ready to prop my feet up but I didn't want to leave Epcot!! 

We ended our day with dinner at San Angel Inn in Mexico and the food was YUMMY. We really struggled with where we wanted to dine in Epcot because we love Le Cellier in Canada but we had never done San Angel Inn and figured we should try it. Thankfully, Canada/Le Cellier had a fantastic small filet to eat as part of the Food & Wine Festival so we got our Le Cellier fix! San Angel Inn was delicious and officially my second favorite restaurant in Epcot. Le Cellier is hard to beat but San Angel Inn did not leave me disappointed at all. 

It's hard to pick a favorite park day because they are all so different and each one has their own thing that makes them special but I really, really loved our Epcot day. It was such a chill day and the food and drinks were so good. I loved walking around each country and popping in the shops. This was the park where I was the least tired and I didn't have to wear the mask as much here either. You can take your mask off when you're stationary, eating, or drinking. Since we were sitting and eating/drinking frequently, I felt like I hardly had the mask on while in Epcot. 

And speaking of masks, yes Disney is enforcing it and no, it honestly is not a big deal to wear them in the parks. I thought it would be hot and miserable but it truly wasn't. I think because you're having so much fun you forget about it being on. And you can always go somewhere to sit down and take it off whenever you want. I felt completely safe at Disney. They have hand sanitizer machines before you get on and after you get off each ride--something they should definitely keep up forever! Zero worries as far as that goes. And getting to experience the parks so empty is so. much. fun. Scott and I are forever spoiled now. 

Hollywood Studios tomorrow!