Eliel and Yza

The day after our successful spelunking activity, we all woke up early the next day, excited to catch the Kiltepan sunrise. Unfortunately, it was raining... so no sunrise. :( We'll catch it next time, then. (Yes, there will be a next time. Definitely going back!)

So we ate breakfast (the cheapest we've had during the entire trip -- "bottomless" pancit canton) at the Residential Lodge and waited for further instructions. We were supposed to trek to Bomod-ok Falls that morning. However, the locals had an ongoing tribal ritual that weekend so we had to change our plans and go to the less famous Pongas Falls instead. Pongas Falls was not a bad option at all, and we had tons of fun there. They say that the trek to Bomod-ok is longer and more tiring, but the trek to Pongas was more challenging.

The Sagada Saga: Power Trekking to Pongas Falls

The afternoon we arrived in Sagada, we had a quick lunch (foodie post here) and went straight to the action. The original plan was to trek to Bomod-Ok Falls and to take a quick dip. However, if I remember it correctly, weather conditions weren't good for trekking, so our guide decided that it's best that we go spelunking instead. (Oh memory gap. Now I know why I should have written this right after the trip =/ )

This is me AFTER conquering Sumaguing Cave. Felt so happy to still be alive!hahaha

Dexter, our tourguide from Anywhere Philippines, asked us whether we wanted to go on the Cave Connection (Lumiang Cave + Sumaguing Cave) or to go through Sumaguing Cave only. Well, as I was terrified of going inside one cave, I definitely have no plans of going through two caves. Lumiang Cave, as they've described it, involved a lot of crawling through small spaces, and some underwater submersion, with the whole Cave Connection experience lasting for about 4 to 5 hours. No, thank you. Sumaguing Cave for 2 long hours sounds just about fine for a girl who never really liked caves. I felt that it's gonna cave in on me. (LOL, I think I just made a joke.) Also, I'm scared of running out of oxygen to breathe. (OA, I know. Haha) Thankfully, my friends had the same train of thought. The other group, however, decided to do the Cave Connection. Well, good luck to them. *evil laugh*

The Sagada Saga: Spelunking at Sumaguing Cave

And 5 months later... I'm finally back to blogging, still trying to finish up posts about my favorite trip of 2012 to the beauuuuutiful Sagada, Mountain Province. Before life got in the way, I only got around to posting about the food. So now, here's the rest of the trip. :)

***

One long weekend last August (almost half a year ago.hihi), Jessa, Ria, Eliel and I, together with Jessa's childhood buddy McBeau and her boyfriend, Gjerico, traveled all the way to Sagada for the ultimate outdoor adventure of the year. We had so much fun, I'm really glad Jessa and Ria decided to fly in from Cebu for this, despite the storm warnings (thankfully, the storm never materialized and we only got a few rain showers here and there). But I'm getting ahead of myself.

On August 24, Friday night, we all met up somewhere in Makati with the rest of the tour group. Dexter of Anywhere Philippines was our travel guide for the entire weekend. We were the last group to be completed since we had to wait for Ria who came straight from the airport. Once she arrived, we split up into to vans and started the long drive to Sagada. But before that, we would be having a quick stopover at the Banaue Rice Terraces viewpoint.

After 11 hours and a couple of stopovers, we arrived at the postcard-famous Banaue Rice Terraces. I can't even explain the feeling of joy at finally seeing this masterpiece with my own eyes. It really is as amazing as they say it is. I can't imagine how the Ifugaos of two thousand years ago made these with their bare hands (and probably just a few tools). Wow.

The requisite couple-shot

The Sagada Saga: Stopover at the Banaue Rice Terraces

Chino's been proposing a "campus food trip," wherein the plan is that we eat at all the famous food places of the different universities. It never happened.

The closest we got was this jogging trip (yes, we did jog...for a little while), turned food trip (we ate more than the calories we burned) at UP Diliman.

Being the UP "native," I acted as the official photographer while the two Lasallians ate everything within a 5-meter radius of the UP Shopping Center.

First stop was Rodic's, home of the best tapsilog in the world.

UP Food Trip

We just turned 5! =) It’s been a while since we had a decent anniversary celebration though. We haven’t really planned anything the past few years just because I almost always had a business trip during our previous anniversaries.

Year 1: Enchanted Kingdom (the last decent celebration)

Year 2: Just played Farmville on our anniversary (giving each other crops and farm animals. lol)

Year 3: I was on business trip in the US.

Year 4: I was on business trip in China.

This year, no business trips were planned and no Facebook games to distract us. Haha! Our anniversary this year fell on a weekend, too – enough reason to plan for something.

Five and Still Alive!

While traveling to Sagada is no quick and easy journey, the good news is, at the end of 12 hours of long and winding roads, the town welcomes you with some delightful culinary offerings. In short, everywhere we ate, the food was good. Healthy, too. Most meals come with generous servings of fresh vegetables. ("Yuck." --Eliel)

Before arrival, we were already warned that food preparation in most of the establishments usually take quite a while. We found this to be true, and we especially felt it when we enter a restaurant already hungry and wanting instant food.

To make up for the prep time, they present their meals beautifully. The instant reaction of everyone (on our table at least) was to whip out their cameras and take photos. We endured another hungry minute or two for food pictorials, as evident in the photos below.

***

On arrival, we headed straight to the Salt and Pepper Diner. We ordered our food and then walked to the Residential Lodge to check in and freshen up. True to warning, our food still wasn't ready when we got back and we had to wait a little bit longer (about an hour in total -- see tired photo of Jessa, Ria and myself below). We were such a big group having lunch and the restaurant was packed, so we totally understood.

Most meals are at Php 150 with rice and Php 180 with baby potatoes. I got the Classic Inutom which basically is salt and pepper chicken. The chicken was cooked well and was super tender. I'm no food critic, but I think it's one of the best fried chicken dishes I've tasted. I would probably order the baby potatoes on the side the next time I get to visit.

The Sagada Saga: Food Trip Edition

For the past few years, there's always a sure-win solution for boring weekends - a jamming session with Chino, or "Rakenrol" / "Rock en roll" as we often call it.

It always starts with a :

"Tsong!"
"Sup?"
"May lakad ba kayo?"
"Wala naman."
"Rakenrol?"
"Game!"

...or something to that effect.

Most of the time, it doesn't always turn out to be a jamming session - just purely catching up on things about life, law school and whatnot. But during those few times when a jamming session actually happens, we are just Intro-boys (a word play with reference to the '90s Pinoy pop rock band Introvoys) - we seldom finish a song, just until the intro / first parts, then move on to another song. We get bored quickly like that! Haha!

This is one of those very, very, very few moments that we actually finish a song, and what better way to immortalize it than to capture it on video!

The red theme was purely coincidental. The nerdy glasses, though, were last-minute additions to the overall theme.

Here's our take on Karmin's Brokenhearted featuring one of our No. 1 fans (yes, we have more than one. haha.. just kidding).

P.S. This is also the debut video of my new glow-in-the-dark egg shaker. Yey! Maybe next time, we'll shoot a video in a dark room to showcase its glow-in-the-dark features. Hmm, okay, I'll look into that.

Come on, that's right, cheerio! =)

Cheers,
Eliel

Brokenhearted

We're turning 59 months in 3 days, hence this somewhat sweet/cheesy video of us trying to be all Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Not sure if you can see the resemblance, but you will if you look closely. No rolling of eyeballs, please. We're currently in the middle of a very long weekend (4 days!) and we obviously have a lot of time in our hands. :)

Anyway, speaking of our sweet 59th, here are some recent photos of our literal sweet escapes.
Yesterday, we dropped by J.CO Donuts and Coffee and lined up to see what the fuss was about. In the end, regretted not buying a whole dozen because the doughnuts are really good. Oh well, guess we'll have to wait until the hype dies down before we return.

Discovered the nearby branch of Mochiko at Malugay Street. Now, we can drop by anytime we get a mochi ice cream craving. Yey:)

One of our afternoon meryenda food trips at a nearby stall that sells the yummiest, softest bananacues. As in, the best I've ever had in my whole life.