Day Four, May 11: First Company Visits and More Salsa (¡Pero más picante!)

Today we had our first company visits.  We started off visiting the Bosque del Mausco, a mushroom factory.  They use natural composts, so the smell wasn't exactly the most pleasant thing in the world.  Luckily, that was problem once we moved inside where the mushrooms were actually cultivated.  It was fascinating to see the whole process, because I've never really thought about where consumer mushrooms come from.  We got to see how the mushrooms started from just the layer of peat moss and compost, to the full grown mushroom.  They also package the mushrooms there, and it was interesting to see this process as well.  A lot of the work still involves human labor, so all in all, it is a hands on process.  After the mushroom factory, we visited Conservas Centauro.  It is a company that cans fruits, vegetables, and prepared meals.  But their specialty is tomatoes, and they told us that they are number ONE for tomato products in Chile.  Most of their production is done between the months of January and April, so there really wasn't much going on at the factory right now.  Still, we got a tour of the facility and we got to see all of the production equipment and what role it has in the production process.  We even got a few free samples, of a couple different types of jellies and also a can of whole pealed tomatoes.  The tour guide was very nice, probably the friendliest Chilean I've met so far.  A bit after our tour of Conservas Centauro, we had another salsa dancing class.  It was lots of fun, but the dancing as a whole was a lot more difficult this time.  I'm starting to grow quite fond of Chilean dance, it's very intense and very entertaining.  Two more company tours tomorrow, and hopefully a laid back day.