This bike ride was on: December 28, 2008
Note: Long entry again and pics aren't that good coz of the rain and fog.
Mayoyao, Ifugao. When we woke up, the breeze was as cold as yesterday. Like Sagada, Mayoyao has lots of tourist spots. They have waterfalls, caves and many more. I also learned that Congressman Chungalao is from Mayoyao, if you're a mountaineer you probably know him.
We went up the police station to get more shots of the town proper. Had small chitchat with the police. He said that he saw 2 bikers yesterday going up Mayoyao, we told them that it was us who he saw. Pinapahirapan daw namin sarili namin (trans: the police said we're being too hard on ourselves literally speaking by traveling on bike). But honestly, we dint feel much pain on our butts coz we were excited to bike everyday.
Then Vivian (the store/inn owner's kid) called us for breakfast. Fun kid. Mahiyain daw with the other kids, her mom told us, but was playful with tourists like us. Me and Vei had 2 sunny-side up for breakfast. Yummy! Since it was also sort of a convenience store in the area, I bought 2 small packs of Bear Brand milk. Then we also got 1 box of Cloud 9 chocolates and 1 plastic full of Jelly Ace.
We then packed our things, and wore the same clothes we had yesterday which I handwashed the night before we slept. We had no choice. As soon as we pedalled and got past Mayoyao it was already starting to get hot coz of all the pedalling we were doing. The uphill we biked yesterday was downhill bliss today. I just got pissed off becoz my stuff kept fallin' off my bike's beam rack about 3-4 times. Nonetheless, me and Vei both enjoyed the very muddy, rocky, slippery downhill along side the mountains.
It was already 1pm but were still miles away from Bangaan. So when we got to Ducligan, we decided to rest and have lunch at a sari-sari store. We had 2 packs of spanish bread (5 each), 1 can each of Tuna and softdrinks for lunch. We still have biscuits, chocolates and jelly as trail food in case darkness catches up on us. Bait ng mga locals, the store owner had a lil chit-chat with us. She was just all smiles.
When we were near Bangaan, it was again raining, very muddy as well. We had coffee. Saw some foreigners again. Met some peeps also from Manila. One was even complaining that he got his shoes dirty and had to clean it right away, then he saw our shoes. He just shrugged off his complaints haha. We packed our 30-40L bags. Also tied up our additional baggage on our bike's beam racks.
Then pedalled all the way to Batad. I had a flat when we were just starting going to Batad. Lost a spring in one of the rear wheel's skewer. Biking all the way up to Batad was really challenging. Why? It was raining and a bad combination for rain was the rock garden and very muddy trails. Rock garden meaning the road was filled with large rocks which can get slippery and hard to bike since it was going uphill and we had an awfully big bag (as Steve told us) as added burden. Not to mention it was also freezing cold again in Batad. I was delighted to see our breath fog up as we exhaled!
When we reached the place they called Saddle we just rested a bit then decided to trek down going to Simon's. It was already very dark. It was still raining so we dint dared biking even though we had our bike lights (which I lost, still can't find it up to now). Again, the trek going down Batad was very dark, slippery, very, very muddy some parts also very rocky. One wrong slip and you'll be french kissing the terraces in a few minutes.
It was a challenging trek downwards since we had to carry our bikes on some parts of the trail, and the 40L bagpacks on our shoulder sometimes keeps us off our balance. I thought we were at muddiest but we were wrong. It took us 2 hours trekking downhill at Simon's and then we coincidentally met Vei's mountaineer friend Mimi's. We asked for directions since we plan to bike from Sagada, Besao, Patiacan, Quirino, Tirad Pass, Candon.
We were freezing cold and our order took 30 mins or more to be cooked. I ordered 1 rice but as you can see the rice was enough for 2 persons.
I cleaned my bike, handwashed again my used clothes, cleaned my shoes too. Sorry OC ako sa bike ko eh pati sa amoy ko hehe. I even took a bath, even when it was freezing cold. We slept peacefully and I bet it was a snorefest again.
Tomorrow we're gonna bike back to Banaue and ride a bus going to Sagada. This is Day 3 of 5.
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