My arms were aching from
yesterday's wrestling match with the car, but all was soon forgotten
as we started to look at our plans for today. Now that we had found
the way to get to Alto del Carmen and San Felix, after our failure to
find our way out of Vallenar, today seemed a good opportunity to
get it right. Bart & Marijke were going to take it easy around
Huasco and Juan & Florencia wanted to take another look at C. humilis
ssp australis. But first, Bart wanted to show us a location near
Freirina where, on a previous visit, he had found 'some interesting
Copiapoa'.
And so we drove through Freirina, Bart suddenly
turned right into a narrow street with an impressive 30 m (100 ft) of
steep concrete steps at its end. How on earth were we going to get up
them? At the bottom of the steps, we turned left into a street that
eventually led us south out of the town. As the road zigzagged up the
hill, we drove through cactus covered scenery. We stopped, 1 km out of town
(S590), to see what we had found: Copiapoa
alticostata, but a much healthier and varied population than the
one that I was familiar with, further inland at Maitencillo. Now I
really understood why this taxon is considered to be a natural hybrid
between C. echinoides, that is usually found on the northern
side of the Rio Huasco and C. coquimbana that has its
distribution area to the south of the river. Both the natural parents
were clearly present, but the hybrid offspring was by far the dominant
plant. So if this was proof that Copiapoa genes can cross
rivers, what stops them from spreading further than just the area
immediately around the opposite shore?
This of course prompted the question of how much
farther south C. echinoides and C. alticostata could be
found. A quick look at the maps, a brief discussion and the plans for
the day were shelved and we agreed instead to see if we could get to the end
of the track at Labrar, aiming to stop every 5 km to see what was
growing along the track.
Those contemplating coming along for Copiapoathon
2007 should note, that although quite detailed plans are drawn up in
advance - in fact we have already started - Rudolf, Ricardo and I are
quite capable of changing our mind of what we'll do on the day. That's
why we encourage participants to organise themselves into car parties
that are capable of implementing their own alternative plans. Our role is
primarily facilitating in the field, and if we should wish to change plans on
the day, we'll make sure that those that want to stick to the original
plan have all the information needed to do so. Arrangements agreed to
meet up with others on a particular day at a particular place are set in concrete and will
only be broken if the health of cars and participants leave no other
option, when every attempt will be made to contact the other parties.
S591 was at the top of the hill, at a sign
indicating that the track to to east went to the Freirina rubbish tip
- thanks for the warning. C. altocostata was still the dominant
Copiapoa. We continued south.
S592 was near Piedras Grandes, Here we had moved into
C. coquimbana country, but with two forms, both clumping, but
one with large heads and the other with more, but smaller heads, with
only a few C. echinoides and C. alticostata plants
found, but where one draws the border is very subjective. Again, the
plants were in flower. We took some pictures of the
flowers in cross section as I wanted to prove my gut feel that the
shape of the flower is not a reliable aid in identifying Copiapoa
taxa. Here were cup-, no, almost saucer-shaped flowers and narrow funnelform flowers all within the same species. How did I know they
were from plants of the same species? Because they came from the same
plant! Juan found some Eulychnia fruits - the largest I have
seen, definitely E. acida.
S593 was on a plain, with hills in the distance.
Looking ahead we could see our track zigzag up a hillside - more
switchbacks! I was comforted by the size of the trucks that would
regularly come past us - the Hilux should easily take these bends - and
yet concerned about meeting one of these monsters head on - would
their brakes work? Desert scrub was the dominant flora here, but once we started looking
between the shrubs, we soon found a number Copiapoa - were
these coquimbana or alticostata? The longer you look,
the more confused you become.
We drove up the Cuesta Arco Molle and stopped to
take some shots of the road below us. It was a bit too dangerous to
park for any length on these bends, so we moved on to km 14.650,
according to the road side marker (S594), but my only pictures here
were scenery shots showing Eulychnia and Miqueliopuntia
S595 was at km 19.650 (clearly there was some road
building planned for this track, why else would the area have been
surveyed in such detail?) The cacti hiding between the shrubs were
Eriosyce, Juan suggested the name E. huascensis, which I
see should now be E. eriosyzoides ssp. atroviridis var. huasccensis
A. Hoffmann & H. Walter, but who has labels long enough to accommodate
such names?
At
S596 we found Copiapoa in flower. Surely
this was C. coquimbana, but with white farina? And with the
longest spines I have seen on any Copiapoa. But what else could
be growing here? Miqueliopuntia miquelii was also in flower
with pale yellow or pink flowers. The sprawling Eulychnia that
I had first noticed at Los Choros appeared on the scene, so
floristically, there was a connection between this location and the
Llano de Choros?
At
S597, I spotted the sprawling Eulychnia
in bud: E. acida with the uncharacteristic hairs as
seen at Los Choros, not quite as long and dense, but definitely hairy.
Angie also spotted a nice 'Eriosyce-with-the-long-name' in flower.
We passed signs for the settlement of Fraguita, but
failed to find any dwellings, then signs for Cobaltera, apparently a
deserted Cobalt mine and Cementero where again the name seemed to
suggest why people might have settled here, but where were they now?
And so we arrived at our goal, Labrar (S598). Before the trip, back in England, I had checked
Google for Labrar and found that the (translated) definition of
the word in Spanish is: 'To work in an office. To work a matter, to do
something. To cultivate the Earth. To plow. To do, to form
something.' Curious! Labrar has a population of 215 people
living in a 7 km radius. We only saw two men, three horses, some dogs
and a collection of sheep and goats, but that was actually at the
landmark sign. I had found pictures of the two 18 m (54 ft) tall chimneys,
built by Carlos Lambert in 1830, for a
copper smelting plant. They were given National Monument status in
1980.
These two chimneys are the only evidence remaining of the famed Huasco
copper mines of the mid-19th Century.
There was a deserted campsite with a toilet block
without a door, but not much else. Juan made some enquiries at the
nearby house that revealed that it was possible to follow the track to
El Sarco and so link up with the tracks to Domeyko and Los Choros that
we had visited earlier on. Today we did not have supplies to test this
advise and needed to get back to our luggage in the hotel in Huasco, but this has
been pencilled in as an interesting possibility for 2007.
We drove back as three individual car parties,
stopping where fancy took us. Angie & I stopped at or near some of the
places already reported, to take more pictures and a bit more detailed
look.
Tomorrow our 3 car team would start breaking up,
with Bart & Marijke staying on for another few weeks, travelling north
to Antofagasta for their flight back to the Netherlands just before
Christmas.
