Walang PALAG sa PULAG

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When a fellow mountaineer asked me that we climb Mt. Pulag this holy week, I wasn’t able to say “yes” immediately. What? The highest mountain in Luzon and just the two of us? He must be kidding when he said that. Honestly, I consider Mt. Pulag as my dream climb but I planned to climb it with some experienced climber. It is just my second year as a “mountaineer” (as I called myself) but I never had any experience on camping. So far, I have climbed about 6 mountains but all climbs were completed before that day ends. In short we are just day trekkers since most of the members of our group are afraid to answer “ the call of nature” when they are away from civilization. Considering that the minimum days required to reach Pulag is 3 days, for sure we will need to set up camp. I can survive without cooking as I can live without rice. But with out any rest room? … hmmmm… I still have to try. Anyway, it’s a now or never situation so I agreed with the idea. As a responsible mountaineer, I need to do a lot of research from the internet and probably from some person whom have already been there. I was a bit frustrated at first as most suggest that to be able to get to the jump off point, one must hire transportation from Baguio to the Ranger Station. That it why they advice that we go there as a group so we can lessen the cost of our transportation. But don’t despair there is Norton bus to the rescue!!! Most of the itinerary that you will find in the internet does not mention this so it somewhat gave me that go signal to pursue my dream climb. Since we are scheduled to climb on a holy week, we decided to be there a day earlier to avoid those “peak season incidents”. We have just completed our climb at Pico de Loro and Mt. Famy this year so I thought that I have already made some preparation for the big climb.

A day before the climb, I am already busy packing stuff that I would need for the climb. I planned to bring 4 long sleeve shirts, 2 pairs of mountaineering pants and a jogging pants, a wind breaker some mittens, 2 bonnets and a scarp in preparation for that cold cold night at the camp. And not to forget all the canned goods, trail foods, water and other personal stuffs. Finally everything was inside that waterproofed hiking bag. And then the lift off begins…. Oh men … how am I going to carry this 19 kilos bag. My back will surely break before I even reach the summit. Any way, the weight of the bag is still not beyond 1/3 of my total body weight so I guess my body can still handle it.

We took the 10:30 trip to Baguio via Victory Liner bus and arrived at their new Baguio terminal at 4:30 in the morning. Had an early breakfast with some hot chocolate and a dunkin donut to tame my noisy stomach. The terminals comfort room was so inviting that I decided to do my business there earlier than scheduled. It was a success!!! Since the first trip to Ambangeg is at 9:00 we visited Jollibee along session road and ordered another breakfast and some take-outs for our lunch and dinner. (I told you we don’t intend to cook at the campsite). We then took a taxi to the Norton bus terminal and paid 40 pesos for the taxi fare. We arrived at the terminal around 6:30 and hang around there till the first bus to Kabayan arrived. Inside the bus there were some passenger who seems to be going Pulag too. Though they don’t look like a typical mountaineer but rather as picnickers, I approached Lulay and had some chat with her regarding their itineraries. It was a relief in our side that we are not totally alone on our way to Pulag. The bus left the station at exactly 9:00 and we reached DENR after 3 hours. I was able to verify that they have received our reservation a week prior to our climb as the name of our group was written on a white board inside the conference room - “HTML”. We attended the 20 minutes talk before we started our trek to the Ranger Station. If you intend to walk, you’ll be at the ranger station in 3.5 hours (minimum) - 4 hours. This means that you will never had a chance to catch the sunset. But don’t despair; it is true that money can save you time and strength. You’ll have two options: (1) hire a jeep to the ranger station. This will take you approx 1.5 hours at 1600-2000 pesos one way. Or (2) hire a porter at 400 pesos. Believe me these porters can run despite carrying a heavy backpack. This will take you a record breaking 2.3 hours to reach the ranger station. From the ranger station, it will take you another 2 hours to reach Camp Site 2. Again, a porter is available to help you at 250 pesos. But you must hire a guide as required by DENR at 500 pesos for 2 days 1 night. Unfortunately, while we are walking our way up to camp 2, the rain started to pour. We pitched our tent at camp 2 while it was raining and right after it was done, we took an early dinner (thank’s to Jollibee) then fixed all our things in preparation for the cold night. After everything was in order, I went out of the tent and checked for the rest room. Hmmmmm…. Ok so there is the rest room. It reminded me of days when my mom was still young … it was already dark when the group that we met at the Norton bus arrived (COA employees). So far there were only three groups at camp 2. The COA groups left their butane gas so we offered our extra and in return they invited us to dine with them. We brought along some canned tuna too. A technique we have learned to lighten once load. Share all the foods you may no longer need. We had fun having dinner with them and we even took some pictures in the dark. Before we all went back to our tent, we agreed to wake up at 4:00 to catch the sunrise at the summit. It was around 1:00 am when I started to feel the cold so I have added some more shirts and socks to keep my body warm. 4:00 am came and we all started to assault the summit carrying flashlights and light stick. We reached the summit first after 1 hour of walk. By then, my socks are already wet and that added to the coldness that I feeling while at the summit waiting for the sun to great us. Just a few minutes another group from the Akiki trail arrived and 4 more groups followed. We all greeted one another “GOOD MORNING and patiently waited for the sun to show. The view was breathtaking as the sun started to show up. My camera started to work non stop taking every shot of the rising sun. Soon my hands started to get numb that I have decided to put on my mittens again. (I am having a hard time pressing the shutter button of my camera so I thought of removing it). We stayed there for 1.5 hours, took a light breakfast at the summit then headed back to our camp. At the camp we started to pack our things and headed back to the ranger station. We are supposed to catch the last trip to Baguio at 1:30-2:00 but unfortunately, we had no luck even if it only took us 2.3 hours to go back to DENR. The Norton bus that should take us back to baguio arrived 30 minutes earlier for a reason that I still don’t understand. We have waited till 4:00 hoping that some vegetable dealers would give us a hitch to Baguio. Finally we are back to reality that it is already impossible for us to go home. So instead, we went back to the DENR station and spend the night there. I guess it was a blessing in disguise as it gave us more time to mingle with other mountaineers. We even had the chance to meet Mering, the DENR Superintendent whom I have only met by phone. She was so kind that she even offered the conference room where we can lay our sleeping bags to spare us some noise caused by the visitors in the living room (but not by the television… he he he). I guess when you are so tired, you became unaware on what is happening around you. Still, I had a good sleep that night on top of the four chairs arranged in one line. The temperature inside the room is tolerable that I only need one layer of clothing and the sleeping bag to keep me warm all thru the night. The morning comes and we are all ready to catch the first trip to Baguio. Again, we missed it as it arrived an hour earlier. I’ve heard that the Norton bus schedule isn’t dependable especially during peak season. So I advice you to be there an hour earlier of the expected schedule. Anyway, another bus arrived and finally we reached baguio as early as 10:15am. We took the 10:30 bus to Manila and arrived at Manila around 5:30 pm. I took another bus to Batangas, my home town and was able to catch our 7:30 dinner with my family.

So now that you know how easy it is... papalag ka pa ba sa Pulag?

Some additional info:
(Expenses as of April 6, 2004)

Manila to Baguio (Victory Liner) 285
Baguio to DENR Ambangeg (Norton Bus) 75
360 * 2 = 720 (Two-way transportation fare)
Camping Fee/Green Fee/ 175
Guide Fee 500/2 250

720 + 175 + 250 = 1145 total expenses/per head
*computation above does not include food and water
You can cook ,eat and use the facilities at the DENR office.
Food can be bought at Ambangeg village.
Water and CR are available at the Ranger Station
There are water sources available at camp 2. Just ask you guide and he’ll get it for you.

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Photos

the sun at pulag
I came I saw and conquered PULAG (and the sun too)