Sagada, Philippines
Sunday, January 14, 2007
Well i did a little tour up to the mountains, it was the most Phenominal bus ride ever, 6 hours and looking out the window the whole time. Up in the clouds passing terraces of vegetables and rice as far as you could see.
Sagada is a beautiful little mountain town and very quiet as well a nice change from the busy highway through
San Juan and a nine oclock peace curfew wow can you say good sleeps. I went for a few hikes around the area got a guide with a few people and checked out a really cool cave we had to take our shoes off and wade through water and climb up and down sections with rope it was fun. After
Sagada i toured ontop of a jeepney to
Bontoc and then to Banauee. Spent one night in Banauee and then rented a trike and got dropped off on the side of some rice terraces and hiked into Batad. Wow they call it the 8th wonder of the world it took them over 2000 years to build all of these rice terraces and they didn't use any slaves unlike the pyramids in egypt. They built all of this for survival, staple food rice and it only supplies enough for their own villages. The rice terraces are absolutely amazing and there are no roads to the villages the only way in is to hike. I did a 2 day treck while i was in Batad, from their to Cambula to Pula and back to Banauee. I stayed overnight in a little village called Pula hiking through rice terraces the whole way it was amazing. Then early the next day hiked through alot of jungle and back to the road just in time to catch one of the many buses for my tavel back to
San Juan. It was a great experience, and the most amazing hike that i have ever done. Oh ya and it was freezing up there, I could have used a winter jacket, there were also lots of pine trees which reminded me of back home until you look closer and see some bamboo and a couple palm trees in the mix.
