Kidnapped! Chocolate and Caves – Episode 4

Episode 4 – original air date Jul 28, 2018

Taking you from Virginia to Pennsylvania. We began at the surprisingly weird and wonderful Virginia Musical Museum, then did two fabulous escape rooms in Richmond (Escape RVA and its phenomenal sister property, Warehouse 29), where we also paid our respects to Edgar Allan Poe by viewing a lock of his hair, his boot hooks and a few other items on display at the Poe Museum. We danced in an appropriately dignified fashion around the huge whirling ball called the Kugel and drove down Monument Drive.

Stopping in Fredericksburg (former home of George Washington) we found a cool LOVE sign sculpture. Then we headed to Pennsylvania.

In Gettysburg, we toured the battlefield and entered the room inside the Willis House where Lincoln spent the night preparing to deliver a certain little speech. The streets of Gettysburg are said to be haunted with the ghosts of those who died in the battle, and we went scouting for them on a lantern-lit ghost tour provided by Mark Nesbitt’s Ghosts of Gettysburg Tours.

A stop in Hershey, the chocolate lovers’ mecca, was mandatory. As always, we took the kitschy but fun Disney-like ride through a simulated chocolate factory to see how all those goodies are made, from harvesting cacao pods to wrapping the finished product – which we sampled at the end.

Then it was on to Lost River Caverns in Hellertown, PA. Yes, there really is a river lost under the ground somewhere. We didn’t find it, but we did hear it.

We finished the week in the Bethlehem area, where the abandoned steel mills still attract gawkers. We stopped for a while to browse through the Banana Factory, an arts center that teaches classes, exhibits art, and has art summer camps for kids. Because with a name like Banana Factory, how can you pass it by?

QUESTION: Have you tried an escape room? Tell us about your favorite in the comments below.

Special thanks to Virginia Musical Museum, Poe Museum, Escape RVA, and Ghosts of Gettysburg, and Lost Cave for providing the adventures.