February 9 is National Chocolate Day but most of us think of today, February 14, as the day that we truly get serious about celebrating chocolate.
In all likelihood, the Mayans brought cacao beans, the source of chocolate, with them when they migrated from the southern regions of Guatemala and Belize northeast to Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula. For hundreds of years before Spanish explorers learned of chocolate, cacao beans in Mexico and Central America were ground and used to brew a chocolate tea. As an important part of many cultural interactions, the beans were also left whole and used as currency; exchanged as a tax payment to Aztec rulers; and were worshiped in the form of a Mayan Goddess named Ixcacao.
Thousands of years later, we still indulge ourselves with chocolate. Chocolate lovers can wear it as a perfume, scent their home or office with it, enjoy it in facials, soaks and other spa treatments, and even brush their teeth with it, as it’s believed to be more effective than fluoride in fighting cavities. Most importantly, chocolate lovers can eat it, drink it, (there’s even chocolate wine) and use it as an expression of their love in forms that range from hearts to bunnies and flavor combinations that are as diverse as chocolate covered bacon or mole sauce for your chicken.
If you are a chocolate lover or love someone who is, chocolate can be the perfect inspiration for your next vacation, holiday, or romantic getaway. Here are three ideas to get you started thinking about travel flavored with the romance of chocolate.
The Swiss Chocolate Holiday. Swiss chocolates are some of the more famous confectioneries in the world and the Swiss are both chocolate makers, meaning one who creates the couverture chocolate from the cacao bean and other ingredients and they are chocolatiers, meaning those who create their treats from coverture chocolate.
Globally, Switzerland has the highest per capita rate of chocolate consumption, at an average of more than 25 pounds per person per year. Today, much of the production of the Swiss chocolate you buy outside of Switzerland actually occurs in other countries.
One way to flavor your getaway with authentic Swiss chocolate is to plan a Switzerland timeshare vacation. Whether you are there for skiing and other winter sports or you visit in the summer months to enjoy an Alpine retreat, Switzerland timeshare is charming. Explore Switzerland from the Italian-speaking San Bernardino region in southeastern Switzerland to the French-speaking regions near Martigny on the border with France, as well as all the places in-between where the residents speak both Swiss and the language of fine chocolate.
A Holiday as American as Hershey’s Chocolate. A Bluegreen timeshare in Hershey, Pennsylvania, means vacationing in the hometown of America’s largest chocolate company, where year-round, the air is fragrant with chocolate. Visit the interactive Chocolate World, spend your days at Hershey Park, and enjoy the spacious comfort of Bluegreen timeshare’s, the Bluegreen Suites at Hershey. (You can also learn more about a Hershey chocolate-themed vacation at: Take Your Valentine to Bluegreen Timeshare’s The Suites at Hershey, Chocolate-ly Goodness, The Suites at Hershey Bluegreen Timeshare, and A Chocolate Flavored Timeshare Vacation.)
Belize: Where Chocolate Began. Southern Belize affords the ideal climate for growing cacao and many historians believe may have been the area where cacao first was harvested. You can plan a romantic Belize timeshare vacation and you will not only discover some of the greatest snorkeling sites and the world’s most beautiful beaches, but in the dense tropical jungles of Belize you’ll find the scattered clearings that house the country’s many cacao farms.
Visit during the “chocolate weeks” held annually in March and May and enjoy some of the finest cacao-rich recipes in the world. Belize offers more than 600 protected Mayan ruins to explore, the largest barrier reef in the western hemisphere, the Belize atolls formed by living coral beds that began growing more than 70 million years ago, and of course, divine chocolate.
And while these are three sweet destinations for romantic chocolate vacations, they are only the beginning of the list. Plan an Italy timeshare vacation and visit the country where the chocolate bar was born or perhaps a San Francisco timeshare getaway where you can explore Ghirardelli Square. The point is, when you start thinking romance and chocolate travels, you’ll find the list is much longer and no doubt much sweeter, than you might have imagined.
Don’t miss these 5 Top Resort Destinations for Romance, too.
