Hershey

I'm going to break up our vacation pics into a few different posts, because I have so many and I want to share them all! (of course I think they are all wonderful, haha!)

Monday, our first day at the campground after arriving super late Sunday night and setting up in the dark, we intended to laze around the campsite, go swimming in the pool, and generally veg after our long drive. Shortly after these pictures were taken, however, we were deluged with pouring rain. So we tumbled into the van and went to see a movie instead! We saw Cars 2 and really liked it. By evening the rain had stopped and we were able to cook hamburgers for dinner over an open fire.

Right behind our campsite was this steep little incline. The boys tied a rope to a tree and practiced "repelling" all week!



Brushing teeth at our little water spigot!


Our second day there we drove into the town of Hershey, which was built by Milton Hershey, founder of the Hershey chocolate company, to be a safe and vibrant community for his workers to live in. It is a cute little town surrounded by farmland.



We went to "Chocolate World" where we toured a pretend factory (the real chocolate factory is located in a large nondescript white building a short distance away, and no visitors are allowed). The factory tour was free and very well done. We went on it twice! There were other attractions there that cost money, such as a 3-D movie and a build-your-own-chocolate-bar station, but we opted for the gift shop instead! All our children are now in love with the Hershey company because they learned that their favorite candies are all made by Hershey! Next to Hershey World is Hershey Park, a large amusement park. In the planning phase of our trip, my husband and I thought about taking the family there, but ultimately decided to splurge on something else that was more of a "once in a lifetime" type of thing (our special thing in Gettysburg that was a secret from the kids). There will be other opportunities for amusement parks. In hindsight I am convinced we made the right choice.




Afterward we found a nice city park and had a picnic lunch. The children played "keep away from daddy."



Caught!




It was a fun day!