I think we lulled ourselves into a state of disbelief where Tropical Storm Lee was concerned. Today, we left Carlisle, which was relatively untouched, and headed for Hershey. We knew the park had had some washout issues and were uncertain what we might find. What we found was muddy high water marks more than 6 feet up on trees. Whole fields were flattened and a section of roadway will need to be rebuilt about ¼ mile long. The ground and asphalt was gone on either side of the guardrail. I can’t figure out what was keeping the guardrail there. In other places, you could see debris hanging from branches 4 feet above the ground, road signs were flattened over from the force of the water and large areas of roadside where covered with mud and trees. When we arrived at Chocolate World, the signage indicated the amusement park and the sports complex was closed until further notice and the parking area in front of the Experience Center had only one bus and perhaps 50 cars total. I haven’t a clue how many of those cars belonged to staff members. Once inside the building, a gentleman handed us a map of the building and explained our options. We decided to take the free factory tour and add two paid additional experiences, the Chocolate Tasting Seminar and the Build Your Own Candy Bar. We could have added a trolley tour of downtown, a create your own dessert and the 3-D extravaganza. The factory tour was a mock up of the real thing. They changed this around in the late 80’s because so many people were touring the plant, they couldn’t get anything done. Then we went to the Chocolate Tasting Seminar and were the only two people in the room. There were five pieces to try, starting with milk chocolate, the lowest percentage of Cacao all the way up to a 45% square. We were invited to snap in half, smell and take a nibble to melt on our tongues. The “Guest Lecturer” encouraged us to figure out what the finish of the candy was, similar to a wine tasting. I explained to her I was a dismal failure in the wine tasting experience, but, I could pick up some of the after notes like coffee, cinnamon, fruit and caramel depending on a variety of reasons. I asked about the higher percentage of cacao and she said Hershey makes a Sharffen Berger Bittersweet Chocolate that is 70% cacao. They gave me the last little sample square they had but I haven’t tried it yet. After I share it with Carl, I suspect I’ll be unable to afford the bar. This seminar was entertaining and I did learn to just melt the chocolate on your tongue instead of biting and chewing. I also learned the average milk chocolate candy bar takes 10 days to make ( from Cacao nib to bar ) while the Sharffen Berger sample I haven’t eaten yet takes 45 days. I have a new respect for the common candy bar. The last thing we did was to make our own candy bar. We had to put on aprons, hair nets and sanitize our hands before putting on a plastic glove over my wedding ring. Carl even had to cover his beard. Then we entered the mini-factory and chose our base chocolate, milk or white. They were out of dark chocolate today, bummer! That's the one I would have chosen because it's loaded with antioxidants which are good for you. Then we could choose 3 ingredients to add to our bar. I chose raspberry bits, pretzel bits and butter toffee crunch bits. The other three ingredients were crisped rice, chocolate bits and almond slivers. We watched as each ingredient was added and then followed our bars through the robing process (pouring milk chocolate all over the bar ) until we lost sight of them in the cooling tunnel. The bars would spend 6 minutes in this cooling chamber which would give us time to design our own wrapper in the production studio. It was a touch screen process which allowed us to choose colors, logos, wording and other additives. The board on the wall notified us when our bars were leaving the cooling tunnel and heading to the boxing machine. This was a fun thing to do although I have to admit I would have liked different ingredient options from what they offered. I would have chosen to add coconut or mint chips to my bar with almond slivers on top. There was a space at the end for us to give them suggestions for other ingredients to be considered. The computer also compiled statistics from all the people who have built candy bars. My bar was completely unique. No other person has chosen those exact ingredients. I don’t know if this is good or bad. I spent some time in the souvenir shop and then we hit the camper in the parking lot for lunch. It was the fastest two hours I’ve spent in a while. We were supposed to head to the Crystal Cave in Kutztown but the lady at the souvenir concession thought they were closed due to the flooding so we passed and headed to our “campsite” for the night. When I built the trip tik for this alternate trip, I may have put in the wrong information and had I not read ahead we would have driven 25 miles north to turn around and drive 23 miles south. It saves us time and gas. Our generator is puttering away while Carl is watching TV. And me, well you know what I’ve been doing. You’re gonna miss these daily blogs when this journey is over, aren’t you?
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