Sunday, May 8, 2022 Mother’s Day. Poconos, Hershey’s Chocolate World, Virginia.
It was a relief to wake up and see a little spot of blue sky through the clouds and not hear rain pattering on the roof of the RV. The Poconos had received over 1-1/2” of rain in the last day.
We bundled ourselves into John’s car and headed to the top of Big Pocono, where Summit Lodge is located. The Lodge has a Mother’s Day brunch, but it was closed when we got there. There were viewpoints of the surrounding territories and we were surprised to learn that Big Pocono is not on Pocono Mountain.
The “Mountains” of the Appalachians look like hills to us westerners. We could see all the way to the Catskills in northern New York on the horizon over a series of low valleys and hills.
There were several large but largely vacant tourist oriented businesses all around the base of Big Pocono including at least two sizable water parks. We could also see snow making machinery and cleared out ski runs down the face of Big Pocono. It’s proximity to the metropolitan Newark and Manhattan probably lead these facilities filled to capacity during the summer months, but during early spring, especially in the rain, we practically had the place to ourselves. It was nice though to see the Big Pocono State Park in the daylight, partially clear skies and no rain.
We then drove back to the RV and checked out of our Boondockers Welcome site, caravanning with John in his car to the city of Easton, NJ.
We were able to find parking and get a table at the Williams Family Restaurant, which was a nice family owned and operated family restaurant large enough to handle the Mother’s Day brunch rush. We got there about 1pm and had a wonderful Mother’s Day Brunch. John and Janet ordered Omelettes while Ben ordered a Belgium Waffle with fresh strawberries and whipped cream.
We also got a side order of scrapple, which John explains is a loaf made from oats and meat scraps picked off bones boiled for broth making. It’s a Pennsylvanian/New York phenomenon, and it tastes a lot like a sausage patty. We also happened to also get a side order of sausage links for comparison. The food quality and portions were excellent and so was the service despite the Mother’s Day crowd.
After brunch, we parted with John, who headed southeast back to Jersey City, while we headed west towards Virginia.
We made an unscheduled stop at Hershey’s Chocolate World in Hershey Pennsylvania. Janet had remembered taking a factory tour back in the early 1980’s when she was living in New Jersey for a while. Boy, has the place changed since then. Approaching the Hershey’s Factory, there is a huge sports arena and entertainment complex, and surrounding the Hershey’s chocolate factory is a huge chocolate theme park with multiple extreme roller coasters and other attractions covering what looked like over a hundred acres. The approach was like driving into Disney World in Orlando.
We were lucky to be able to park right on the curb in front of the factory because we were just going to visit the factory, and not the theme park. The factory is attached to what is perhaps the world’s largest candy shop the size of a suburban shopping mall. It sold all manner of candy and chocolate merchandise, and even had venues where you could custom design and make your own Reeses Peanut Butter cups with a rainbow variety of fillings. You could also custom build s’mores using all sorts of candy bars besides plain Hershey’s chocolate bars.
The factory tour started with a very long exhibit hall that was actually a cue for a Disney Theme Park style ride through their demonstration “Chocolate Factory”. We stepped onto a huge rotating platform where we then boarded cars which then carried us through the tunnels of the ride that demonstrated the steps of chocolate production, from the Cocoa Pods to the finished product with animatronics, holographics and other displays substituting for an actual factory floor.
The production values were just like the latest Disney rides. That was quite unexpected, and really put the Jelly Belly Factory’s self guided $5 tour to shame. The Hershey’s factory tour ride was free, and at the end of the ride you got to choose from either a mini Hershey’s chocolate bar or egg filled with Reeses pieces. We ended our tour with a trip to the food court where we refreshed ourselves with a strawberry and chocolate Kit-Kat bar milk shake.
Heading west out of Pennsylvania and into West Virginia and Virginia, the 4 lane freeway was flanked by farms and fields, eventually opening up into the enormous and lush Shenandoah Valley. Janet drove her first shift behind the wheel of the RV.
Diesel prices in Pennsylvania were probably the highest we have seen during this trip, except for Death Valley. Most stations had diesel for $6.60 and many were as high as $6.99. Fortunately, we were able to make it into West Virginia where the diesel was $5.699. We took on 20.295gal with 22,330miles on the odometer (15mpg).
We drove past lots of civil war sites and monuments, as well as many billboards advertising several limestone caves. A civil war buff could easily spend a week exploring this part of the country and not run out of sites to visit.
We reached our Harvest Host site, Brothers Craft Brewing in Harrisonburg, VA at 7:30pm.
Google Maps said it would be 5 hours of driving from the Poconos to Harrisonburg VA, but the stops for Mothers Day Brunch and the Hershey’s Chocolate factory tour made for a long day.
Tomorrow should be an even longer driving day- the longest by far planned with 8 hours of driving to get to Janet’s cousins Randy and Ann in Nashville.
