Our second day in Morocco started off early with a traditional Moroccan breakfast buffet. We had cornbread, cornmeal pancakes, loaves of white bread, croissants and eggs- it was a very heavy meal to start the day but it held us over until lunch. Our first stop of the day was the Atlas Bottling Company plant in Tangier (our second Moroccan city). This factory is one of several Coke subsidies in Morocco.
CIEE had arranged a tour of the plant for us. To enter the plant, we had to wear these snazzy protective coats that you can see below. I was lucky enough to get a onesie instead of a coat!
We were split up into three groups- I completely lucked out because I was placed with the Production Manager of the plant. It was obvious that he was the man in charge and he knew the most about what was going on. Unfortunately we weren't allowed to take any pictures of the bottling process (something about the process being secret...). However, we were able to see the canning process, the plastic bottling process, and the glass bottling machines- they were being cleaned so there wasn't any glass bottling while we were there.
On the can line, it was an Orange Fanta day. We were able to see the entire process from cleaning the cans, to filling them, sealing on the lids and packing them. Our guide even selected a freshly sealed can for us to taste- it was delicious. On the plastic bottle line, they will filling bottles of Hawaii- a tropical orange drink that is only sold in Morocco. It was overly sweet for my taste, but as I said before- Moroccans love their sugar. We were even allowed to keep a few souvenirs from the tour, as you can see in the picture below:
There is an orange Fanta can and the lid, the label for a Hawaii plastic bottle and a Coke glass bottle, as well as a plastic tube. The plastic test-tube like object is actually what they use to make their plastic bottles. The plastic is heated and put into a mold. Hot air is then blown into the plastic tube at extraordinary pressures so it fills out the mold, which is in the shape of the bottle. It was a really fascinating process to see. We ended the tour with a free beverage of our own. I tried Poms, a Moroccan apple soda, which was also a bit too sweet for me. But overall, it was a great visit to the Coke factory.
Next on the schedule was an exchange with Moroccan students. However, because we happened to be there during their spring break, our group got a trip to the beach instead. Although African beaches tend to be "a mix between garbage dumps and bathrooms" according to our bus driver, we carefully made our way to the water anyways.
It was nice having a few minutes of free time during a very busy trip. We even took the time to take a group photo:
Then, it was time for lunch. We drove a short way to a beautiful restaurant overlooking the ocean from the top of a cliff- the view was incredible.
The food was also fantastic- another satisfactory meal in Morocco. We started out with a salad, then had Pastilla with fries. Pastilla is a traditional Moroccan dish which has been called Pigeon Pie because it was originally made with pigeons. Luckily, ours was chicken. It was a delicate pastry dough filled with spiced chicken meat and topped with nuts and cinnamon- absolutely delicious.
The waiters also found us quite amusing. They only spoke a few phrases of English and kept talking to us in Arabic- which none of us understood. They would also have us repeat Arabic phrases to them and them laugh hysterically at what we were saying. It made for quite an entertaining meal. We finished up with cookies and sweet tea, as per usual.
After lunch, we drove to the Caves of Hercules. These caves are symbols of the continent of Africa, largely because of the cutout in the picture below. From the inside of the cave, it is reversed but from the ocean looking in this cave entrance is approximately the shape of the continent of Africa.
Here is the same picture flipped horizontally:
You could say that's a bit of a stretch, but it looks enough like Africa to me! The rest of the cave was interesting as well, but the pictures didn't turn out well. At the cave entrance was a small tourist trap that reminded me a lot of the Caribbean- restaurants, souvenir shops, and cute little boys selling things. There was one boy in particular that was walking around with his donkey. Everyone in our group was taking picture of him with the donkey, which seemed to confuse him a bit. Then he decided it was a business opportunity and began charging one euro for a photo of him and/or the donkey- I was impressed with his business sense!
Unfortunately, we couldn't stay long because we had a very important appointment to keep with my new best friend below.
How could we go to Africa and NOT ride camels? I rode horses quite a bit when I was younger, but riding a camel is definitely a unique experience.
As you can see in this last picture, they sit down in a very lopsided manner. It was a fun ride- I would honestly like to do it again sometime when I'm not being led around like a child on a pony. It would also be fun to have it last for more than 5 minutes. But for the first time, I really enjoyed it.
At this point, we headed to the actual city of Tangier. Tangier is a much more modern, touristy city. We only had one body guard for the group in this city and we were allowed to go off on our own to shop- I felt entirely safe traveling around in a small group to the shops. I ended my second day in Morocco with an overly successful shopping trip.
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