Today was Ingrid's day as she lead us to S681, where Rudolf had taken us two days earlier. It was such a great spot that the small group that had already been there that time did not mind in the least to have a repeat visit. For me it was an opportunity to leave the still camera in its bag and to go walk-about with the video recorder in an attempt to capture the immense number of plants found here. Each occasion I visit a stop, it gets a new stop number as conditions may change over time. Today's visit has therefore been recorded as S683.

The convoy set off again for a stop in Quebrada El Bronce (S684) where the cinerea were clearly more columnar, with stems to 116 cm tall, and less branching. While I used a tape measure to take the stem size, Cliff used a marker pen to draw lines on his leg of the tallest plants he had met. He had to pull his short up dangerously high to reveal the line of the tallest plants, showing off more of his anatomy then had been intended. 'It's gone cristate!' Ian exclaimed.

Again, the plants covered the valley floor and disappeared over the hills in all directions. How many millions of Copiapoa had we seen today? Ricardo explained how, in a similar location, they had traced the roots of several large plants and had concluded from what they had found that the roots formed a dense mat throughout the population group. It would therefore be difficult for new seedlings to become established, as they would be competing with the root systems of older plants for the little moisture that was available.

I had found it funny that we had turned into this quebrada on a track that was immediately adjacent to one of the Navy signs forbidding entry to this, their extensive exercise terrain. Ingrid and Ricardo smiled; 'How dare they appropriate and destroy parts of nature that belong to everyone?!' Just to make the point we lined up all the cars in protest next to the sign as we left, to register our protest. What is the point in training people to defend land on behalf of the nation when the people of that nation and their tourist friends are unable to study the natural history of organisms that for years have occupied the land? 

The next stop (S685), fairly brief, west to the Sierra Vetada, just made the point of how many more C. columna-alba plants there were - millions more! We followed the track along the foot of the coastal hills for another 7 km or so, when the track turned into soft sand. Ingrid pointed to the hills (S686) where we would find C. taltalensis. And we did! And in flower! Yellow flowers!  But wait a second! These plants looked more like C. marginata, except that marginata doesn't come from here. OK, so they looked more like C. echinoides. Same problem! My suspicions that Copiapoa were just a single, highly variable species was back. But what then about the small C. taltalensis / apahnes that we had seen near by, east of Taltal in recent days? Those plants had been quite different from these, even though they are allegedly the same species. I was becoming more confused by the minute. Even as I write up these notes and review the images of that day, I have to repeat to my self 'environmental factors' in a loud voice. But am I convinced? Can someone throw me those octagonal Copiapoa-ID-dice?

The scenery from higher up the hills was brilliant, with the Ocean, near S662 from earlier on the trip, visible to the south. Now, we found C. taltalensis there too - must compare pictures in weeks to come. A great, thought provoking stop! And there was a bonus: we had to drive back through the C. columna-alba valley to the main road, and try as I may, I could not resist taking a few more pictures here.

We made two more brief stops: S687, along the Ocean, to see sea shells and fossils, and S688, which was just a marker for a future trip to take a look inland.