Despite last nigt's wine input (or should I say, as a result of the wine) we had quite a nice cactus focussed program today. Some light background reading, to answer my question if Echinopsis (Trichocereus) chiloensis this far south was answered by Ritter in Kakteen in Suedamerika where he notes that Trichocereus chiloensis var australis should be around here. Florencia remembered seeing tall cacti on previous visits, but before she was really interested in cacti and she could not be sure of the exact location. Never mind, if they were here, we'd find them.

And so we made our first stop (S727) at a 'Y' junction near the Lugano Torca home, where we walked around at a GPS reading that I had uploaded into Google Earth while still in the UK. Without the benefit of a live broadband internet connection, there was no more that I could do then note the coordinates. Now that we were on the spot, it became clear that the explorers who had recorded these coordinates, had used this spot to leave the car and continue on foot; a common practice that I am guilty of my self. After all, such data is primarily intended for the person who records it, so that they can find their way back some time in the future. He may well have additional pictures, notes and his memory to direct him from these coordinates to the exact spot where the plants grew at the time. From a 'scientific' point of view, very detailed coordinates are not necessary when producing a distribution map for a specific taxon; usually if a plant is recorded to grow at X, it can also be found within a 10 or 100 or even a 1000 m radius from the spot. I remembered that I had bought my camera (Nikon D200) and GPS so that the metadata that the camera records for each picture can include the GPS co-ordinates of the camera at the time that each picture is taken. Very useful, as long as you also take a picture at the point where you leave the car and, most importantly, if you spend the £100+ and are able to track down a source for the short cable that links the GPS system to the camera. So far I had been unable to do this.

We took the track where Flo thought it most likely that she had seen Trichoes in the past and before too long, we found them at S728, 3.5 km from S727. When putting my GPS data from this trip into Google Earth, back in the UK, I found this is the exact next spot that the originator of the data for the previous stop had recorded. Google Earth shows a lot more vegetation at these spots and my pictures at S728 show Trichoes dotted between fairly recently planted 1 to 2 m tall Eucalyptus trees on fairly bear sandy soil that look as though top soil was recently washed away - fitting right in the scenario of what happens when natural forests are removed and not replanted quickly enough. The Trichoes were infected by scale insects. Back home in the UK I found that my database has this plant growing another 77 km farther south (more accurately, 85 km to the south west) at Punta Valdez, north of Constitucion.

They say that the camera never lies, which is why I'm glad to have pictures of the GPS coordinates at the next, unplanned, stop (S729) which I have down as 'the Salt flats between Puente Zapallar and Puente Yoncaven'. When putting these coordinates into Google Earth, the scenery looks quite different from that recorded in my pictures. The stop was prompted by Leo spotting Eriosyce subgibbosa ssp castanea in flower on the bank to the west (left of) the track.  Unfortunately, there was a barbed wire fence between us and the plants, but what is a barbed wire fence when it's between a cactus and a cactophile armed with camera? Nothing! The plants here were much more densely spined than those we had found the previous day, but these grew on rocks basking in full sun while the habitat yesterday had plants growing in a much more shady environment.

Google Earth suggests some small cultivated plots to the east side of the track. The pictures taken today show why I referred to this place as 'the Salt flats'. It seems that this valley is connected to the Ocean and that 'making salt the hard way' (flooding rectangular blocks of land and letting the salty sea water evaporate) is considered to be a viable commercial enterprise. I guess that the Google Earth view is a few years old and that the 'cultivated plots' might in fact be the first of the rectangular areas, separated by low dykes, which hold the sea water or the white slurry that seems to be part of the processing cycle.   The verge on the east side of the track was covered in a low ground cover plant that had very salty tasking leaves and seemed to attract water from the air. No ID yet for this plant.

We made two more stops today; S730, some 10 km NNW of Santa Cruz, where we found more Echinopsis chiloensis and S731, 4.2 km southwest of the town, where we found Eriosyce subgibbosa ssp castanea and more Echinopsis chiloensis.