Today is a move day! And guess what? We're headed to some place chocolatey! It's time to go to Hershey Pennsylvania and the Hershey Thousand Trails Camping Resort!
"Welcome to Hershey! The Sweetest Place on Earth!"
And there's just a 1 hour drive from Drummer Boy campground to Hershey Thousand Trails. I was happy about that!
The town of Hershey is pretty amazing. It seems like a planned out community that's super clean with high upkeep. It reminded Theresa and I both of Celebration Florida. It was founded in 1903 by Milton Hershey for the company's workers.
The street we're driving in on goes through the Milton Hershey School, which was founded in 1909 by Milton and Catherine Hershey. Their photos are on either side of these columns.
The Milton Hershey School is a private boarding school for K-12 students. Admission is free and restricted to students from low income families. It's paid for from the trust containing the Hershey fortune.
The town of Hershey is pretty adorable. Look at the light posts! They're topped with Hershey's Kisses! The wrapped ones even have the Hershey's Kiss flags sticking out of the top.
There's two large smoke stacks with the Hershey name on them.
Even the street names match with the town's history.
We're starting to get close to our campground. What views they have here. Blue skies, open fields. So pretty.
We're staying at the Hershey Thousand Trails campground.
After checking in at the main office, we were free to pick any site that we wanted. There's a couple that looked good that were backing in sites, but then we came across this one on the end and it's a pull-through spot! It'll take it!
One of the things we've been told about in this location are a non-native pest called the Spotted Lanternfly. This pest isn't harmful to human, but it wreaks havoc on the trees in the area. There's no natural predator in the states for these bugs. We were told to squish them whenever we saw them, and boy did we see them a lot. The kids swatted, stomped, and killed them whenever they could.
When we got in, they gave us a list of all the different activities that were available here, and there's certainly plenty to do. The kids read that there was a Candy Guessing game and they were super excited.
Alli - I eat candy! I'll be great at that! Except Ian, you know what 3 Musketeers looks like!
That's cute Alli, but I think it's a different kind of Candy Guessing game. Probably where you have to figure out how many of something are in a jar.
We've got to walk our bikes in the common areas, but it's time to go explore the campground. There's certainly going to be a lot to do here!
And the grounds were kept up nice too.
Since they have a pool, after a stop at a Walmart, the kids got noodles for the pool. They set themselves up like this and asked me to take their photo.
And they love their new swimming skills. I'm getting more and more confident in their abilities by themselves in the pool now.
Theresa has been wanting to take up a new sport to get us out there and moving and Pickleball looks promising. She bought paddles for the four of us and we've just needed a place to play. Hershey Thousand Trails had two pretty nice courts and they were never busy the entire time we were there.
The kids wanted to know how to play, and in the weeks before while we were talking about it, it was a running joke that before every serve you had to eat a pickle.
The morning after we arrived, I woke up, went outside, and my stomach sank. The area underneath the RV is flooded. I just had a water leak a couple days ago that I fixed. I looked all around the area but didn't see anything on the RV. We are downhill from everything though so I started looking further up the hill at the next RV. It's looking pretty wet there too! Turns out the neighbor's water filter had cracked and fell off. Water was flowing uncontrolled from their pipes and must have been for hours to get this wet. I turned it off then let them know. Whew! I'm glad it's not my problem!
School is starting in Michigan soon, but before they go off to college, Aubrey, Ethan, and Aunt Rita are coming to see us! Alli has so been looking forward to seeing Aubrey again.
Unfortunately for the kids, the ice cream was basically soup on a cone. I wonder how they even made them scoops in the first place. It started dripping down their hands almost immediately.
But the kids love it either way. It did turn us off to getting ice cream again from them though.
At the Activities desk, you can check out all sorts of equipment. Normally I'd expect to have to rent paddle boats, but these swan boats were available to check out for free!
Alli, Aubrey, and I took one swan (a female with big eyelashes), while Ian and Ethan took the male with a bowtie and buttons.
Let's go swimming!
Everyone!
They love having visitors.
After swimming why not pickleball too?
I think we've tired them out! But that's not the end of the story. We had such a fun time that I've got to split this up into a 2 parter! Stay tuned for more!
Aubrey and I worked the paddles while Alli controlled the steering. We were able to get pretty close to some turtles.
Ian figured out a way to reach the peddles. That's got to get tiring! They had a fun time paddling around the lake.
Very nice group picture of all 7 in the pool. Such a special visit by Rita, Aubrey, & Ethan to make the time even more enjoyable at the Thousand Trails Park. The TT Park offered some unique activities/things (pickleball & paddle boats; even the complimentary bike pumps!) to add some different fun in the mix. The many biking trails (the one along the pond w/ the geese and the one under the canopy of trees were very pleasant sites) was definitely another plus. The TT Park looked very well-kept and scenic. So relieved to read that the big water puddles under the RV wasn't due to a new leak (when I started to read about the water under the RV I thought "oh no, not another leak!")...what a BIG sigh of relief for you after discovering the water source. Those Hershey Kiss Light Posts are so cute! EOM
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