Argentina & Chile --- November 2008--- San Pedro de Atacama to Susques (Argentina) --- 320km

[Mike P]

And another......
[attachment 17300 eee1.jpg]
Only another twenty colour variations to go now.....

[Mike P]

To add a little variety here is Soehrensia uebelmanniana.
[attachment 17301 ee1.jpg]
On a bed of Opuntia.....

[CoronaCactus]

Loving the Opuntia flowers!
That T. atacamensis is pretty awesome too! Any idea how old/large they need to be to bloom?

[David_L]

Just to add to the Maihueniopsis minima controversy, I saw this plant at Quebrada Guatin. It may simply be a weaker spined form of Mike's 'minima' or it may be yet another different species.


[attachment 17318 Maihueniopsis_sp.jpg]

[David_L]

The Soehrensias were some distance further down the road from Quebrada Guatin. I don't have a name for the place, I just have it down as 'roadside'. The view was spectacular, here are some of the party photographing Soehrensia uebelmanniana with a good impression of the surroundings. As can be seen there were large clumps of Opuntia camachoi here too.


[attachment 17320 scenery.jpg]

[David_L]

There were young plants as well as mature flowering sized specimens.


[attachment 17321 Soehrensia_uebelmanniana.jpg]

[David_L]

I couldn't find any plants with flowers open, but here is a nice bud. The spines are pretty impressive too.


[attachment 17322 Soehrensia_uebelmanniana_bu.jpg]

[David_L]

After this stop we returned to San Pedro for lunch. I had stew; this was quite tasty, but I must confess I did remove the intestine rings! After lunch we headed to the edge of town where the border post is (although it's 200km from the 'actual' border) and completed the border formalities. We then headed out towards the Paso Jama pass over the Andes into Argentina. This is a much better road than the one we entered Chile on and is much busier with lorry traffic. The scenery was again pretty amazing and the heights reached (4800m) pretty impressive though not good for altitude sufferers. The first stop that we all insisted on was to get a good look at the volcano that had been brooding in the background ever since we arrived at San Pedro. I believe it's called Volcan Licancabur and is 5916m in height. It's another perfect volcano shape, just as a child would draw it. BTW you can follow our steps over this and the previous couple of days on the map here. http://www.copiapoa.info/images/maps/rut_b_1.htm


[attachment 17471 vol.jpg]

[David_L]

A closer view of the summit thanks to the wonders of the zoom lens. The white bits on the side of the volcano are small accumulations of snow in shady crevices.

[attachment 17472 volcano.jpg]

[David_L]

As we got higher we began to see more signs of the salt pans and salt lakes that are such a distinctive feature of the Altiplano area. Not many creatures can thrive in these lakes but the flamingoes love the minute algae that grow in the salty water. These are Andean flamingoes. This one was quite cooperative and allowed a quick shot through the window of the van.


[attachment 17473 Andean_flamingo.jpg]