Hagdang hagdang Palayan Part 3: Visiting the Village

Hagdan hagdang Palayan Part – 1: Journey to Batad
Hagdan hagdang Palayan Part – 2: Trekking to Batad

We ordered lunch as soon as we arrived at Simon’s Inn. While the food was being prepared, we were taken to our room assignments and settled in. I slept for a bit so I will have energy for our trek to the village.

Lunch was simple – chicken, mixed vegetables and rice- but filling.

Around 2:30 pm, everyone was ready. The group had 2 guides, ours was Kuya Vicente.

Just below the inns in Batad is the only school in the village, Batad Elementary school. I asked our guide where the children take their high school classes. He said, you have to go to Banaue if you want to study high school.

Here are some of the pictures I took.

 View of the terraces from the trail.

 Mini falls along the trail. Falls such as these gives continuous water supply to the rice terraces below.

 Rooster in one of the village homes.

 Another community on top of a small hill.

 Yellow wildflower along the terrace walls. Kuya Vicente said they use this as fertilizers for the rice.

 This is Kuya Vicente, our local guide. I told him I will be posting his picture in the internet. He gamely posed for me.

 Sadly, our rice terraces succumbed to the forces of nature. This part of the Batad rice terraces collapsed during typhoon Juaning in July 2011. Forty-three rice paddies owned by thirty owners were destroyed.

 Our first pit stop was this hut in the middle of the ampitheater. Notice the dog. 🙂

 Kuya Vicente pointed out an interesting fact about this hut. Look at the foundation.

 The whole structure sits delicately on top of the rice terraces’ stone wall.

 Grave of a rice terrace owner.

 We finally arrived at the village.

Huts were built on stilts. The lower part serves as the owner’s workshop of some sort.

 I am amazed by this mortar. It is completely carved out of stone.

 Cute kid with his mother. I asked permission first before taking their picture.

 The village walkway.

 Kuya Vicente pointed at this pile of stones (covered by weeds) beside our trail. He said it is actually a grave about 20-feet deep into the mountain.

 Almost two hours of walking and we were tired. We needed some rest and a beautiful view.

 Remember the dog at the hut earlier? He followed us throughout our trek, acting as our second guide. 🙂

 See our canine friend climbing up the steep trail? 🙂

 At the end of our trek, we were rewarded by this view of the mountains.

Given the chance, I’d go back here and enjoy some more of the community, the history, and the view.

Next up is Part 4 – The morning in Batad.

Hagdan hagdang Palayan Part – 2: Trekking to Batad

In my previous post, I talked about our journey from Manila up to the Batad saddle. Now, I will tell you about our trek to Batad.

I got this feeling of a different kind of excitement, the moment I got out of the jeepney in the saddle. The feeling was like “This is it!”. You know how that feels like, in some way or another, right?

In the saddle, there was this little store, selling all sorts of essentials (and trinkets) for visitors like me.

I figured the trek will not be that easy since they were renting these sticks out for 10 pesos each. You return them when you get back. I was considering getting one, however I decided not to since I don’t want the extra weight with me. I figured, I can just pick up some lightweight sticks along the way (which I did).

The trail started out rocky. Then, there were fallen trees, landslides, spring water, cement… I didn’t take any pictures since I was concentrating on not falling down the cliff. Hehe.

On our group’s first stop, I took in this view. It was enough to let me forget the long walk ahead.

After more than hour walking downhill, we finally saw welcome signs of different accommodations. This could just mean one thing. We are nearing our destination!

A few minutes after the signages,  I looked up to see how far we have walked down. Dom pointed up and said, “That’s the saddle. That’s where we have left off earlier.”  I was like, “Where there?”

I zoomed my camera and voila. I saw the little store! I thought, “So we have walked THAT far?! I think have never walked that far down a mountain in my entire life.”  Then suddenly, a wave of “Oh-No-We’re-Going-Back-Up-There-Tommorrow!” feeling engulfed me.

We turned another bend a few minutes later, and this view greeted us. I felt rejuvenated once again! This is my first glimpse of our wonderful rice terraces.

Magnificent isn’t it?

After that beautiful welcoming sight and after about an hour and a half of trekking, we finally arrived in Batad. First things first, we have to register at the Tourist Information Center.

After registration we went straight to our accommodation, Simon’s Inn.

Our weary bodies were rewarded by this sight from the inn’s balcony.

The Batad Rice Terraces, the ampitheater style rice terraces were carved from the Ifugao mountains around 2000 years ago.

Next up (Part 3), will be about our walk to the village below.

Hagdan hagdang Palayan Part – 1: Journey to Batad

When the year turned 2011, I made a mental list of what I wanted to do.

1) Travel solo

2) See the rice terraces (may it be in Sagada, Batad, Banaue… basta rice terraces)

3) Go to Angkor Wat

I didn’t know how I can do these during that time. Heck, I even didn’t think I’d have the chance in 2011, but somehow, I held on to the thought.

In July, I accomplished No. 1 by traveling to the US alone. Well, up to Dallas-Fortworth Airport anyway, but still. I counted it as it is. Hahaha!

In August, I knew I was going to accomplish No. 3 since this year’s family trip happened to be there. (Hooray!)

When October hit, I knew I’d have to postpone No. 2 some other time. That was until Theo invited us to Batad (in Ifugao province) on the 19th to 20th of November! Yes! (Amo na ni!)

Friday night (8pm), we headed to the Florida Bus Terminal in Sampaloc to meet with Dom (www.escapeislands.com).
Hindi kami doon sasakay but as Dom explained, mas maliwanag daw kasi doon.

We proceeded on to the Ohayami Bus Terminal, one block away from the Florida Bus Terminal. As soon as we placed ourselves in our spot, we got ready to get some sleep. We needed energy for the next day as it just won’t be fun trekking to Batad, sleepy.  By 10:30pm, the bus left for Banaue passing by Solano, Nueva Viscaya first.

The bus air conditioning was insane! It was so cold, my shoulders were tensing on their own. If I was to imagine sleeping inside an icebox, I think our situation there would have been very close.

I woke up at around 7am. By this time we were already in Lagawe, the capital town.

Minutes later, I peeked outside the bus window and saw this!

Half-complete na ang umaga ko.

Half-complete just because the other half would be breakfast! I was starving at this point. Finally, at around 8am, we arrived in Banaue. There were plenty of fixers waiting for tourists at the bus stop. We didn’t have to deal with them since Dom already prearranged a jeepney for us.

There were 19 of us travel mates and we quickly squeezed ourselves inside the jeepney so we could go down the town proper. I guess everybody was eager to have breakfast.

We stopped at Halfway Lodge to have our breakfast with a view.

Ahhh, hot choco to warm the tummy!

Good old Filipino breakfast to start my day! (Rice, hotdog, scrambled eggs, banana)

Our breakfast was made extra special with these views of Banaue town.

I am just amazed at how much load from the structures this mountain cliff can hold.

After breakfast we were about to set out to Batad. I saw this map inside Halfway Lodge. The plan would be an hour jeepney ride from Banaue to the Batad Saddle. Then from the Saddle, it will be about an hour to an hour and a half trekking to Batad Village, where we’ll be staying overnight.

The jeepney ride will be a combination of…

Patches of cemented road,

Wet dirt,

Dry dirt (look at the normal jeepney capacity),

Rocky,

One pine trees-lined section,

Some sections of the road were just within some scary distance from the edge of the mountain!

Finally, we arrived at the Junction. There was a bit of a problem at this point, since the dirt road from the Junction was impassable for our jeepney. By consensus, we were resigned to just trek going to the Saddle. It will be an additional hour of trekking.

About 10 minutes into the trek, we already felt exhausted. Hahaha! City dwellers. Good thing though, almost miraculously really, a half empty jeepney arrived and we managed to hitch a ride going up the Saddle. Woohoo! Our jelly legs were saved. 🙂

(2 minutes into the trek, nadikitan na agad ako ng halaman.)

Minutes of rough roads later, we finally arrived at the Saddle.

Part-2 will be the Trek to Batad. 🙂