East Coast Driving Trip 2015 - Day 7
Our plan today: Hershey's Chocolate World
We went through the website last night and booked a few things we knew we wanted to do. We had to jump through a few hoops to get our tickets printed out... as we rarely travel with a printer. But hubby is a genius and has the patience of a saint - so it all worked out.
We breakfasted here at the Lodge - Chocolate was consumed for breakfast. Some had in it the coffee (that would be me) and some had it in the french toast, others had chocolate chips in pancakes and others had chocolate pancakes with raspberry drizzle... hey, when in Hershey!
Chocolate World is free to enter, the tour is free as well. They charge for parking (above 3 hours, but free if you purchase tickets for at least 3 things) and the more hands-on experiences. We enjoyed the "Chocolate Tasting Experience" - it was a medium-size group with a guide to take us through the proper way to taste chocolate with all our senses. The presentation was great, nice use of media and tech. It was fun to watch the kids try to "let the chocolate melt on your tongue" "don't chew"... Ummm? they are kids with chocolate... they really really want to chew it :) [Editor's note: The sophistication of the tasting/tour at Hershey compared to the tasting/tour at
Theo Chocolate was, shall we say, similar to the sophistication of Hershey's chocolate to Theo Chocolate...]
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| Ready to taste some Chocolate |
We also took the free tour of the factory about 5 times. This is a people mover type ride that takes you through a representation of the factory teaching you the process of making milk chocolate. There is a jingle that is sung by 3 cows... and played throughout the exhibit. I have forgotten it for the time being, but I have a sinking suspicion it will return to me at a most inconvenient time, and I won't be able to shake it. Thank you Hershey :)
We also did the 4D movie they have, and we helped solve the mystery. The kids seemed to like this. Having done Turtle Talk at Disney a number of times, I was less impressed. But I like that Hershey is trying new things and they pull it off fairly well.
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| Made of Twislers! |
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| So much chocolate... |
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| and Peanut Butter! |
The last thing on our list for the day was making our own chocolate bars! We donned our hair nets and aprons, sanitized our hands and were all set. Each person gets to pick a base chocolate (milk or dark) then you can select up to 5 add-ons. Today's offerings were: cookie bits, toffee bits, pretzel bites, butterscotch chips, and mini chocolate chips. You could also choose to finish the top with sprinkles if you'd like.
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| We are ready! |
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| The base chocolate bars... add ons to come..... |
Using the barcode on your ticket you enter all your preferences and then scan your barcode again to start production. You can watch your own bar be created for most of the process... soo fun!
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| Bring on the add ons (I choose toffee bits and preztles) |
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| Cover it all in liquid chocolate |
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| all boxed up and ready to be packed in commemorative tins. |
During the part when they are trying to cool the bars... it's much easier to travel if the chocolate is solid ;), you get to make a label... this also uses the barcode to track your stuff.
It didn't take long for all our bars to be cool, wrapped and packaged for us to take them home, with our own labels. This was considered the highlight of the day, by both kids... and maybe me to.
Our afternoon was lazy... sweet laziness.
We did have one errand to run and we picked up dinner at subway - some veggies to counteract all the chocolate.
Stats:
Miles today: 36
Miles total: 506
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