Heisler's Then and Now

I didn’t know what to expect, so I went into it with a mostly-open mind.

For a belated birthday celebration, we went up to my favorite mini golf location. I mean, mini golf on top of a mountain, Belgian waffle sundaes, and a gorgeous setting, what’s not to like?

Except that Heisler’s Dairy Bar was sold over the winter, when Leonard Ostergaard (a Heisler nephew) passed away after running the place for forty-four years.

Oof.

Already the changes were felt. Billboards, a Facebook ad campaign. Live music. A Highland cow for pettins. Sunflowers.

Could such changes, just a touch south of looking a little too bougie to my Gen X eyes, live up to the hype?

Cresting the last hill to the site, the changes were already plain.

Triple the seating area. Triple! Much-needed canvas stretched out to provide more shade, plus umbrellas at more tables. Space that hadn’t really been utilized to its full potential was now being used for seating. This was now a place that was inviting you to stay for a good portion of the day, not the old eat-and-go vibe.

The driving range was open and chugging away, which used to be hit or miss before. Not my thing, but when it’s open, it’s patronized well, and the tees were full.

The old waffle hut is still closed, but I’m betting there are Planz ™ afoot. (I still remember it being open when I was a kid, but it was shut at some point in my early teens because of either septic, or structural, reasons. You can still get the waffles at the ice cream window service, so all’s well.)

The children’s playground area is brand new, and in full swing, pun intended. The sunflower field wraps around part of it, picnic tables (no shade, though) surround the rest of the playground, and you can enter the field at various points to take pictures, or cut some flowers. They even have branded milk jug vases you can use to hold them. This is all new. I don’t know if any of that costs money, but it’s cool that the old pavilion is now decorated with vases and regular milk jugs full of sunflowers.

The arcade is gone, and now totally empty. Maybe that’s where they have the music? I’m not sure about that, though.

The gift shop was very under-utilised, and is gone. There’s a Pretzel Hut in its place, since the new owner also owns the Pretzel Hut in Lancaster.

The totem pole is gone, and there’s a lovely birch tree in its place. (Look, um, I’m all for tradition and stuff, but that totem pole was offensive. Cultural appropriation at its worst, not even close to what was accurate for even the local Lenape tribes. The birch tree is so much nicer.)

The food? Well, they kicked up quality a notch. The regular “eh” burgers have been replaced with smash burgers, which taste a whole lot better.

The pierogis…

Okay, here’s the thing. I love pierogis. I adore them. Cheese and mashed potato filled dumplings, what could be better?

I also don’t like them drowned in grease and butter, because why ruin them?

Yes, it’s great they doubled the portion. (Don’t tell my waistline I said that.) But dear sweet baby flying spaghetti monster on a crutch, what’s with these poor dumplings just swimming in grease?? Come on, that’s ridiculous. I know I have a gall stone, I don’t need to add to the michegas.

And with a smash burger that was also greasy, that’s… not a good situation for someone who’s on serious dietary restrictions.

The pierogis from before didn’t have any dripping grease at all, and were nice and puffed. These are just fried. In butter. They put crunchy onion bits on top to take the curse off, though.

Sigh. I will definitely be sharing my side order from now on. And bringing towels to sop up some of the diet-breaker.

The only thing that really, really ticked me off, that I cannot stand: they went to foam containers for the food. Come on! The waxed paper and cardboard (and even the incredibly sturdy pulp paper trays they are using now) are better than that awful thin foam “stuff” that doesn’t even keep food warm. Why, just, why?

Double sigh.

Well. Thusly fortified and all, off we went to the mini golf.

No, I did not forget the ice cream. I thought, being diabetic and all, it’s better to eat real food, then exercise, then come back for the sugar rush. That, in retrospect, was a grave miscalculation.

Firstly, my back brace wasn’t set right. It kept riding up with wear, and I did rather feel like I was on the sitcom Are You Being Served? (The back brace is for my sciatica, a leftover from when my poor van was trashed by a Ford F-150. We lived, but my spine still feels it.) It caused pain flares whenever I bent over, which is kinda par for the course (yes, I said it!) when you’re playing mini golf.

So, yeah, pain, and exercising right after eating, let to a rather precipitous drop in blood sugar.

Oops?

Still an awesome course, and they’re slowly improving the worst holes (read: putting in more astroturf for the holes that had been worn down to the cement.) And for me, the best part is that they didn’t get rid of the milkweed that’s sneaked into the landscaping, so the larger butterflies were stopping on their fluttery treks.

And the purple martin houses were full, which were lovely to see.

I still don’t know who won – I have the card around here somewhere… (Normally I care, but I was in such pain that I couldn’t care less. But only one hole made me angry enough to want to beat the ball into a flattened sphere, so, um, yay?)

Sugar. Must needs havez sugarz. Allz of themz.

But I behaved. I found a bench in the shade, and hubster went for the ice cream.

Now, even when I was shaking from hypoglycemia, I knew better than to just shovel the crystalline white stuff into my gaping maw. I got a child’s size sundae, teaberry ice cream, with hot fudge sauce, and go easy on the hot fudge. It was almost perfect – I would have loved whipped cream, and a cherry, but you know, child’s size.

And then, hubster’s Belgian waffle sundae appeared…

Hookay. So, in the past, they would tear off one quarter of the freshly made-to-order waffle, and curl the rest into a bowl. Not any more.

So I had a few bites of the hubster’s, and got some of his whipped cream, and cherry.

And even my hubster, MY hubster, said it was too much! Well, maybe, next time, we’ll split it? That might work. We’ll find out in the future.

Teaberry ice cream? Heisler’s has the best-tasting teaberry ice cream, bar none. Think of it as a very intense mint, kinda spearminty crossed with wintergreen, but still a different and unique taste. If you like mint, give it a try. Teaberry fruit is red, so the ice cream is tinted pink.

And, since I was more than a bit fatigued, we ambled home.

And I do mean amble.

It takes us about forty-forty-five minutes to get there. We take the back way, over Hawk Mountain, because my fam believes in taking the scenic back road. We only saw four deer on the way up – at noon.

On the way back? Ten, I think.

We take it slow. We do not need to do the Bambi Tango, thanks.

We went back to my parents’ house, where I got soundly trounced in two games of Five Crowns. Sigh. Whatever happened to birthday luck??

I didn’t take many pics while I was there, except closeups of bees on sunflowers, so I supplemented with a few pics from previous trips. I didn’t realize I was going to write up a travelogue till I was already home.

But we might be taking our granddaughter up there, next week….