Trekking Pico de Loro

Province of Cavite

02 July 2011

Almost a month after Mt. Malinao climb, I was ready again for another one. This time, I want an easier one, something meant for the novice climbers.

I signed up for Mt. Pico de Loro day hike adventure originally scheduled on June 25, 2011. Unfortunately, due to heavy rains brought by several inclement weathers, the climb was moved to July 02.

On the day of the climb, about 16 climbers met at MC Donalds El Pueblo at 3:30AM including myself. I was so happy to see old friends and also to meet new ones. Ka Roger, the person who impressed me a lot during our Malinao climb, was there.

We left Manila on-board a van at around 4:15AM and we had a stop-over to buy some supplies at Ternate town proper. We reached the DENR office/jump-off point at around 8:00AM. We started trekking at 8:15AM. 

Mt. Pico de Loro is part of a protected forest called Mt. Palay-Palay. According to Pinoy Mountaineer, it has an elevation of 664 MASL and it is the highest peak in Cavite. North of it is the island of Corregidor, Nasugbu Batangas in the south, Maragondon Cavite on the east and the South China Sea on the west.

Rock Beak

The trail going up is a little bit muddy but was good in general. It was an easy trek for me. After an hour of trekking and chatting with new-found friends, we reached base camp 1 where we rested for a while and took some photos. The place is nice. We continued trekking and this time, it's a little bit tiring. We passed by a river with clear water flowing down from the mountain. There were few steep climbs. While climbing, I was amazed by the thick forest and the huge stones resting along the slopes of the mountain. We reached another camp past 11:00AM and we rested for a while. The view from this point is truly awesome.

We started climbing the "Parrot's Beak" after a few minutes of rest. I was a little hesitant at first because of the steep slopes. Finally I decided to climb up the rock beak following Ka Roger on the trail. This was the most scary and challenging part of the climb for me. The only way up is to pass through a very narrow passage that requires a sort of "rappelling". The side of the passage is a cliff. While climbing, I had a flashback of the movie "Cliffhanger" that scared me even more. Fortunately, with the help of trail master Guido, I scaled the rock beak.

I was so happy and proud together with fellow climbers who scaled the rock beak knowing that not all climbers would dare scale it.

We started descending to camp 1 where we had our lunch. We continued our descent back to the jump-off point at about 12:45PM and finally reached the jump-off point by almost 3:00PM. There was a tricky part along the trail going down and some said that there were climbers who got lost already. This is true. Five fellow climbers with their guide missed their way back to the jump-off point and reached as far as the quarry area.

They finally reached the jump-off point at around 6:00PM. We left Ternate Cavite back to Manila at around 6:30PM.

It was fun-filled day hike experience! See more photos.

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