What do you do in Central Pennsylvania on an excessively warm summer day when the humidity is unbearable and the lack of clouds provide zero cover from the blinding rays of the sun? You take a trip to Chocolate World, where you cool off with a peanut butter cup milkshake, take a ride through the chocolate making process, and get a free piece(s) of candy. Or you could hop on over to Hershey Park, but that's beside the point because Chocolate World is partially free.
What's the best thing about Chocolate World (besides the overwhelming selection of freshly made candy lining the shelves of about half the building)? Is it the fact that Chocolate World is an escape from the sweltering heat that beats down on you during concert days, the air conditioning providing a much-needed break, and the clean bathrooms providing a much-needed luxury? Is it waiting in line, walking through the newest renovation of Chocolate World, feeling as if you are walking through the factory itself? Facts and pictures hang from the steel grey coloring of the walls. Is it the mouth-watering scent that greets you throughout the Chocolate tour, your senses in overdrive as the sweet smell of chocolate surrounds you? Is it the nut oven roaster, the sweltering heat in the red tunnel? Or is it the singing cows, Olympia, Harmony, and Gabby, whose voices serenade you with the theme song "It's the milk chocolate!"
Well, the ride is being modernized, again, as Chocolate World is renovated about every ten years. The greeting of the three cows singing "It's the milk chocolate" will no longer stand out as the opening of the ride, yet they will still serve a purpose somewhere else in the ride. The current theme song is supposedly to be done away with, a new, more memorable song probably in the works. Just as long as there is a ridiculously catchy song to sing along to with your friends, I will be happy. The ride will still have that classic feel, a feeling that locals pride themselves in and a framework that Hershey grounds itself in. Technology will have a big impact on the upgrade, more digital screens to allow tour-goers a better look into the secret chocolate factory. Away with the decades old, rustic red cars. They will be replaced and enhanced for a more modern age feel, decorated with the themes of a specific chocolate made by Hersheys.
I like trying to guess exactly what is the substance in the “Conching” process, as the machines refine the chocolate to its creamy, silky texture. Is it paint? Is it colored water? Is it actually chocolate? Whatever it is, it has been sitting in that part of the tour four decades of years now, how are they able to preserve it? I hope that some things stay the same, but it is understandable that Hershey needs to keep up the with the competition, keep up with the modernizing world. With a positive outlook on the change, the attraction will be more accurate. With the help of technology, visitors will get a better look at the specificity of the chocolate and other candy making process.
This change will be finished by the time the park opens up for summer hours, the first of May.
