TRAVEL GUIDE | Mt Manabu Fun Climb

TRAVEL GUIDE |  Mt Manabu Fun Climb
Overnight Camp

 

Like a monarch standing proudly, Mt Manabu is part of the Malipunyo Mountain Range as one of its three major peaks. The trails are well established, easy and marked by up to 9 stations circling the mountain. Charming and friendly locals that helps keep climbers hydrated by their offerings of Buko juice along the way, even get a sample taste of kape Lowak or Alamid Coffee brewed by Mang Pirying and his brother Mang Pino while they offer a bargain of their own local coffee produce.

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Batangas | Mt Manabu Fun Climb

BATANGAS | Mt Manabu

A Sykes Outdoor Spontaneous Fun Climb

A fun climb for beginners, hence this unpretentious mountain is perfect for my goal. It was Friday, April 19, 2013 last day for a workweek and I was preparing for what can be an uneventful weekend alone. I lent my camera to my travel buddy so he could cover his explorations of some amazing islands and beaches in Mindoro, I just couldn't come, not without going AWOL from work, so I scrounge it up hoping that this uneventful week would pass. 

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Bulacan | Outdoor Adventures In Madlum

BULACAN | Outdoor Adventures In Madlum
Adventure Trek With Sykes Outdoor

The sun on our backs, our shadows pooled in our feet, it was hot, and it was humid, steep trails, thick bushes, high cliffs, cherry blossoms, bamboo shoots and silent river springs, all in a day’s trek to Mt Manalmon. Lugging our day packs with packed lunches of takeout meals from Jollibee and a happy disposition, it was yet another day of adventure and learning about the outdoors.

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Batangas | Apacible House

BATANGAS | Apacible House

Taal Heritage Town Photowalk

Yet another must visit house in Taal, Batangas. The house of Leon Apacible is a 19th Century bahay na Bato marked by National Historical Institute (NHI) as a place where Jose Rizal, Mariano Ponce and other Filipino National Heroes would gather. Leon Apacible himself was an Officer of the Revolutionary Government, a lawyer, a judge and a Lepanto delegate to the Malolos Convention.

The house is well preserved, as it was donated by the descendants of Leon Apacible to the government due to its Historical value, the house itself felt like its had lived through times. Certainly it is old, with the displays of Caruaje on the entrance, the showroom of old photographs, anterooms and marbles floors, muebles and antique figures, unlike any other heritage houses I visited today where what is left are impressions of an era long gone, this house feels like it has blended in this day and age with people actually living in it. I say probably, kudos to NHI for the restoration and how this house is being presented to the public.

What looks like an in house garage where the restored Caruaje is what greeted us upon our entrance. This was one of the last houses that we visited for this day. I was already tired and yearning for a cold bath since I took this trip right after my night shift work. Not even being with some of the bubbliest travel bloggers I am with could perk me up. Still I trudged on knowing that this house is special, and it was with its own charming appeal. 

Mirrors, a lot of them, antiquities with shiny surfaces, glass pedestals, even the shiny gloss of portraits hung in the walls. The wooden floorboards, intricate stairs lined with iron rails, and the colors or mahogany varnishes all over. I've never been to a house shinier than this. The rooms, bath in filtered light from glass paneled windows provide gloomy atmosphere to the auras around. I've always been one to feel auras, gift of discernment I got from my mother, but I don't think I'm otherworldly or supernatural or a physic if you believe in one. I just know when a place has a presence, discerning good and evil in ways I can't explain. The Apacible house left me feeling uneasy but that we are welcomed. I guess we should feel more grateful for the rich heritage we have, and this heritage of Taal is worth exploring.

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Calaguas | The Rustic Paradise

CALAGUAS | The Rustic Paradise
Of Clear Skies And Pristine Waters

“It’s hard for me to put into words why I like the beach so much. 

Everything about it is renewing for me, almost like therapy...Beach Therapy.”
- Amy Dykens

 Its mid afternoon with light pouing rain. I couldn't pass up the chance to enjoy the gentle waves.

Calaguas or the Happy Beach as some netizens call it is a back to basics rustic paradise off the coast of Daet Camarines Norte.

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TRAVEL GUIDE | Baler, Aurora

TRAVEL GUIDE | Baler, Aurora

The Surfers Haven

Baler is a charming provincial capital of Aurora and location of the famous surfing site for Luzon due to waves coming from the Pacific. What’s so endearing about this lovely town is that it is not limited to the experiences from the beach. Covering a vast plain and some forested area rich with local floras and faunas, natural falls some with famous majestic cadence, rock formations along the coastal areas that is a delight to landscape photographers, and even so for the rich political history and historical contributions this quaint little town and the province it uphold offers. Most but not all, I’ve explored in a day aboard a local tricycle with a hired humble driver.

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Benguet | Fire Mummies Of The Philippines

BENGUET | Fire Mummies Of The Philippines

The Pride And Rich Cultural Heritage Of The Ibaloi's

Photo was taken at the home of our guide in Mt Timbak. We registered before we were escorted to the burial sites of the mummies, the house has a very nice view of the Mountains before it, including Mt Pulag, and this dirty kitchen was homey with charm akin to it.

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TRAVEL GUIDE | Mt Timbak

TRAVEL GUIDE | Mt Timbak

A Sykes Outdoor, Tsinelas Ni Juan Outreach


"May your dreams be larger than mountains and may you have the courage to scale their summits." - Harley King.

Photo Shot in Atok, Benguet on a Sunset in some obscure corners of Halsema Highway that provides a glimpse of the rolling hills of the Cordillera's. 

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Batangas | Of Godly Rays And Rain That Never Came

Of Godly Rays And Rain That Never Came
Inspired By Trekking Mt Gulogod Baboy

Its my romance to the mountain, of the trails in open fields, in high blade grass, in cows poo everywhere, of kids running up and down the slope, of idle houses serving as rest stops, of coconuts and tamarinds, of citrus bushes and scavenging wild guava fruits, of the humid and then the cold air fanning me, fanning us. There was not a moment to reflect when you are running out of breath. Dark clouds looming ahead of us, and I fear for rain to come down, when all I have is a cheap summer tent I just bought. This mountain, these hills, a trail used one too often.

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Batangas | Marcela Agoncillo House

BATANGAS | Marcela Agoncillo House

Taal Heritage Town Photowalk

Like the other Heritage Houses we visited in Taal, The Marcela Agoncillo House is another Casa de Agoncillo. Could be said as the 2nd Agoncillo house because of the most prominent resident this house had ever had. The Marcela Agoncillo house was actually built by Marcela's grandfather Andres Marino. By any means, this is the ancestral house she grew up. Built in the late 1700's and known today to be one of the oldest house in the town of Taal. Heirs of the family had donated this property to the government and is now being maintained by The Department Of Tourism.

The house was turned to a museum and monument commemorating the making of the Philippine Flag, as was Dona Marcela Marino Agoncillo's legacy to our nation as the weaver of the first Philippine Flag, gaining her the title of The Mother Philippine National Flag as its principal seamstress, its the same flag that was hoisted from the window of Emilio Aguinaldo's House in Kawit, Cavite. Check this link to know more about the making of The First Philippine Flag from the National Historical Commission. 

On the entrance, one had to walk through a walkway that looks like a parking lot in the ground floor. Before taking the staircase is the commemorative tableau of 3 women sewing the flag. The three women are Dona Marcela herself as the central figure, flanking at her sides the little girl is her eldest daughter Lorenza and other girl is Delfina Herbosa de Natividad, a niece of Jose Rizal. Before we were to mount the staircase to where the grand salon of the house is place like any Spanish inspired houses, we first went through the small library and museum just a couple of flat forms from the ground floor. We were briefed by a guide of the house with the brief history of the prominent historical figure that had called this home. On this library is the hired weaver showing us how weaving is done. Taal may have a lot of Heritage houses, but only a select number of Historical Landmark, this is what makes this house apart from a lot of Kastillan houses in Taal.

Its a grand house, reminiscent of the glory and richness that adorned its halls. Exquisitely sculpted wooden boxes (Bauls), Chinese and Edwardian furniture's,  the all too familiar Capiz Shell windows, four poster beds, and the everlasting feel of old wood. 

Impersonal and otherworldly, these are but some of the impressions I got from this house. Spacious and open aired, though the family was Illustrado in rank and the children's of Felipe and Marcela Agoncillo all grew up to be highly educated and religious, their old rosary beads left not an impression of themselves. Their old crumbling books fall in decay on the shelves. As was, I wandered in the house swimming in my own imagination, enraptured by the creepy rooms and the baby grand piano by the door, the full length mirrors so clear I can only assume that silver adorned the back of this heavy glass. It's hot, its forlorn and may even be a grave of rich memories, of ages long past whose legacy continues.

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