BINANGONAN, PROVINCE OF RIZAL.
19 January 2013
 |
| Boat Ride |
It's always nice to go back to the basic and so I started my climb this year with two minor treks.
I was so excited to be back on the trail again. This was my second trek for 2013. At early 4:00AM I was eagerly waiting for fellow hikers at a usual meeting place at El Pueblo. I arrived there first.
Our trek guides Chito and Ryan arrived at the place a few minutes after. I was surprised to know that there will only be 4 participants for this trek, myself included.
I was so happy to see fellow hikers - Romeo Bautista and Oliver Pe at the meeting place. After having a short breakfast, We headed to the jump off point at around 4:30AM.
It took us an hour and a half travel from El Pueblo, and we were at a parking slot of a drug store in Binangonan waiting for the operator of a local boat to bring us to Talim Island where Mt. Tagapo is located crossing the lake - Laguna de Bay.
 |
| Laguna de Bay |
We boarded the boat at around 7:00AM. The boat is large enough to carry max of 60 passengers and we were only 7.
We enjoyed riding with the waves as we crossed the lake. There were lots of fish pans with "Tilapia" and "Bangus" fingerlings.
 |
| Trail |
At around 8:00AM we reached Talim Island and we immediately went to the Barangay Hall to register.
We passed by our trek lead guide house located just beside the church to arrange for a lunch for all of us. Up we go the trail past 8:30AM.The wind was blowing and it was cold. This helped a lot in our ascent to Mt. Tagapo.
The trail is very nice. The first 1 hour of our climb was easy with lots of bamboo trees along the side of trail.
 |
| Mt. Tagapo Summit |
The next 1.5 Hours was the little challenging part of the climb - with steeper trail and tall cogon grass at both sides of the trail. We stopped for a quick rest at a nearby camp site and then continued our assault.
The landscape view at this part of the trail is breathtaking. Over looking the impressive Laguna de Bay lake with a background of yellow green cogon grass at the slope of the mountain.
 |
| Landscape view atop Mt. Tagapo |
It was cold at the peak and cloudy. We reached the summit at 10:45AM. We spent the next 1 hour at the top feasting our eyes with the landscape view below.
At 11:45AM, we started our descent. We're finally back at the jump-off point safely at 12:30PM.
After having our lunch, we left Talim island on board the local boat at around 2:15PM and anchored at Binangonan port by 3:20PM. We had a short visit/photo at the old church of Binangonan before boarding our van.
 |
| Church of Binangonan |
We left Binangonan back to Manila at 3:45PM and were all back to El Pueblo 5:20PM.
====================
====================
-----o0o-----
No comments:
Post a Comment