Travel Guide Pukara De Copaquilla

Around km 60 from Poconchile on the road 11 still begins the climb, and gradually the landscape becomes drier. Quickly, the valley becomes almost deserted; the big sand dunes seem to be dinosaurs sleeping for millennia. Then, from km 80, we start to see on the side of the road one of the plant curiosities of the region: the candelabra cactus. It is characterized by its height, from 3 to 5 m, but, above all, by its astonishing shape: a very long trunk, surrounded by what seems to be hairs and finished, as its name indicates, by candelabra-shaped shoots. This variety of cactus only grows between 1,700 and 3,800 meters above sea level. It is called cardón, and its wood is used in handicrafts such as the manufacture of furniture, roofs, doors..