16
Mar
TREK AND CLEAN ADVENTURE
ynasej
It all started with this spam (as what Josie would prefer to call it):

Jes, join ta ani na…
God Bless!
Josie Marie Lupot
Desktop Support, I.T. Department
LEAR Philippine Engineering and Technology Center
MEPZ 2, Basak, Lapu-Lapu City
Tel. no.: (6332) 340-7950 local 6235
E-mail: JLupot@lear.com
__________________________
___________________
From: Su, Scarlet
Sent: Friday, March 06, 2009 12:41 PM
To: Manisan, Jeramae; Bawiga, Ma. Themmie; Estomago, Julius; Campugan, Ferdinand; 'Pineda, Rona'; Elmer Diola; mikel@88floor.com; 'Elmer E. Diola'
Cc: DelosReyes, Charo; Jocoy, Peter Paul Suliano
Subject: RE: Trek & Clean_Batch 2009 Clean-up Trek
Importance: High
Attention! 

Interested parties who have not joined the orientation last Feb. 28, there will be a pre activity meeting for this trek on March 13, 2009 (Friday) @ Kan-anan ni Mergies, Jasmin St., Capitol Site.

For those who made it last Feb. 28, 2009 but can’t make it on this coming pre activity meeting, see you at the Country Mall (main entrance) on March 14 (9:00 am). Any changes will be disseminated thru text asap right after the pre activity meeting. 
__________________________
___________________ 
From: Su, Scarlet 
Sent: lunes, 02 de marzo de 2009 11:07
To: Manisan, Jeramae; Bawiga, Ma. Themmie; Estomago, Julius; 'Campugan, Ferdinand'; 'Pineda, Rona'; 'Elmer Diola'; 'mikel@88floor.com'; 'Elmer E. Diola'
Cc: DelosReyes, Charo; Jocoy, Peter Paul Suliano
Subject: Trek & Clean_Batch 2009 Clean-up Trek
Importance: High
What: Clean up trek for Batch 2009
Where: Budlaan Falls
When: March 14, 2009, Saturday
Details: the trek will start @ Brgy. Budlaan with an estimated stretch of 2 kms upstream.
Necessities: gloves, garbage bag, lunch, est'd. fare 100.00
(no wearing of flip flops for safety reason of the trekkers; strapped sandals or shoes is recommended)
Assembly time: 9AM, Gaisano Country Mall
Estimated time to be back in the city will be at 3PM; we will have our lunch at the falls.
Please be on time.

for more info contact this #'s:
0917-6247971
0922-4230085

see you guys! 
- Please pass this to your friends who are also interested to join us. Thanks =)
For more information, you can login to www.trailsign.tk


Our destination:


Then I invited Tikol to join, Tikol invited Grace, and Willyn, who is stressed from work (according to her), volunteered hastily.

Sad to say that Maghuyop needed to work 12 hours on that day and Master would be rendering an OTRD(naning kay gusto maCEO), thus making them the LOSERS!nyahahaha

As early as 7:00am(early because I usually wake up at 2:00pm) yesterday, Tikol and I were getting ready for the Big Day.Tikol who is a big fan of Rizal never failed to bring his MAKABAYAN hat (nga murag giweave so daghan buslot2x dili makasalipod sa init). By 8:30am, Willyn (fresh from a nightshift work) and Grace arrived in our little house in Ucma.

We started walking from IT park to DOST-Banilad to get a ride going to Country Mall where we would be meeting Josie and Wena and "the others" (lead by Cebu Outdoor Adventure Team, others are from different companies in MEPZ).

While waiting for "the others" to arrive, (Josie and Wena were the first one to arrive), we ate our breakfast at Jobee and ordered some burgers and chicken for our take-out lunch. Tikol, who imagined that we would be going on a picnic, bought a lot of apples and oranges (a few minutes after we will soon discover that it would be far from having a picnic).

5 things we expected:
1. This is going to be a picnic.
2. We can swim at the falls.
3. We will just follow some trails by the river.
4. Willyn was not informed that it is a Trek and Clean activity, so she wasn't prepared for the cleaning part.
5. It would be like a CWTS activity wherein you will be dropped off near the river, walk a little, clean, then a lot of eating.


We started our journey at Sunny Hill Village,Talamban, finding a jeep nga "magpapakyaw" was a difficult job for our "leaders". Yet they had convinced one driver as long as we will be paying 20/head (if duha inyo ulo the isa ka lawas, 40 na inyo bayad..hehehe). I realized after interviewing Manong driver, Tirang and I were seated at frontseat, that it was also his first time to drive that route (bantog rag minsugot!).

It was a long and winding road(char!). Really, i think that road seems to look like the road from Owac, Dimiao to Bilar(reminiscing College years when we took that shotcut during our Environmental Engineering Tour). After around 15 minutes of the jeepney ride and seeing a lot, from Big,Modern houses, townhouses for rent, to some small Bahay Kubos, we arrived at Budlaan (specifically Budlaan Integrated School). 

Then a lady from the Cebu Outdoor Adventure Team (COAT) told the driver that we should have taken the steeper road on our right. Manong Driver remarked, "Trekking man kaha inyo gianhi? Lakwa nalang na ninyo kay lisod na na itungas.” (His words were something like that).. ABA!ABA!ABA!PILOSOPO SI MANONG!!! hmmp!

And true to his words, the road was really, really, so, very steep. "Gihangak dayon si Mary!” quoting some words from Ticol the great.Ironically, the name of the place is LOWER BAUGO. Are they kidding us?!!It was like we are on top of Talamban and they still call that LOWER?!!! But that was just a "patikim" of what would come ahead of us.



At last!We arrived to a small sitio. I failed to ask the name of the sitio, maybe it is still "Lower" Baugo. I was so engrossed watching the kids and some members of our team playing Basketball. When was the last time I played Basketball? I think it was a year and a half ago, when we used to play badminton at Abellana.And like what I would always do, my only chance to get the ball is magpacute or MANGILOG og bola sa batang walang kamalay-malay..hehe..And it worked! I got my shot, a couple of shots!!! I so miss this game.


And so the real trekking begun. After a group briefing, picture taking and saying a prayer, we started our journey.


At first we were all enjoying the trek, picking up trashes along the way (mga unaunahon jud, bisan sa river pa gani mamunit sugod). Then the rough path became rougher and narrower. One thing I learned from this activity was some words from Scarlett, "Always face the wall!”. If I had only counted the number of times Josie called my name (bisan gasunod ra gud mi, gaTinirang jud!), it would sum up to almost a hundred, I swear!

But all the struggling was paid off when we reached the falls. The view was amazing! The rocks or boulders to be more appropriate since those were really HUGErocks, were all over the place.



After eating our lunch, Tikol and I can't help but play around those boulders. Barefooted, Tikol jumped around from one boulder to another, feeling spiderman. His reason for walking barefooted around the falls? He is in one with nature. (Madrama jud ni si Tikol bah) And did I forget to tell you that he got a cut on his toe?(dah! pagtiniil pa lage!)

So the clean up begun. We picked up plastics that were washed out all throughout the river. I think a dam was built before on that area. But now the place is dry, is this the effect of Global Warming? I saw only a little amount of water flowing, though there were some parts that were deep. If you're careful, you can avoid getting your shoes being wet. So whose shoes went on swimming? No other than Tirang! I can really feel Josie is struggling but for Wena, it was just like a walk in the park.

Our next challenge was to pass through the river and move our way back to the trail. And the only way to do that is to cross several boulders. It’s really a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Why would you pay for wall climbing at MetroSports when you can get a better and real adventure for free? No harness, all we have is the courage and determination to climb up and go down. We were so lucky the COAT was so helpful to each and everyone, guiding us on which part to hold on to, to where to put our feet, to grab our hands from above so that we could get a good lift, and for pushing our ass up so that we could climb up to the most difficult part of the boulder. Lucky I was ahead from the group, the rocks weren’t slippery yet, so climbing was easier, unlike Tikol who was left behind the pack, climbing to the boulders where most of our shoes had stepped on making it a lot slipperier. And because of this, he paused at middle of climbing a boulder which made Grace anxious because she was just an inch behind Tikol. (Unsaon nalang og matagak ag among makabayan nga si Tikol?).

I enjoyed climbing those boulders but wait, there’s more! We just traveled half of our journey. Then from boulder climbing, we found another trail to follow. And it was not an ordinary trail. It was indeed slippery and you’re just a foot and a half away from a cliff! And so Tirang once again was so tensed calling everyone’s name that is near to her. (Tirang, this activity was your idea, right?)

Wait, has anyone heard anything from Tikol? It is so unusual for him to be so quiet! Well, well, well, as what he would reason out, “Si mother nature naman ako kontra, dili ra man officemate or housemate.” (mao ka diha, kani ra diay magpahilom nimo?himuon nalang kaha nato ni everyday!)

We rested for a while, and then we continued following the trail until we reached the river. I think it is the same river (sumpay ra man na sila tanan). We can now call the boulders as rocks since these were smaller compared to those near the falls. And there it was, we saw our hope that we were near to our end destination, we saw two cows, which means that there should be a community nearby, which means there might be a road, which means we could now go home!(Hopefully!..in our dreams)

But the hardest part (for me) of our activity had just begun. We needed to pass through the hill or should I call it a mountain (?). It was so steep that crawling would be the best option to do it, but I didn’t (uwaw kaha!). How steep was steep? At around 60 degrees maybe. The farmers on that area shaped some little stairs going up on the land. We were walking by a”baby’s breath” plantation. This was the part where I almost wanted to give up. I could hear my heart beating so fast. The pressure was rising on to my head. I almost picked my leg up just to go on. We stopped for a while and all of us were amazed by the beauty of the scene behind us. I so love the air. 

Willyn and I were left behind Tikol, Grace, Josie and Wena. And later I would found myself hiking alone just to cope up with them and for me not to be on the last part of the pack so that I could rest longer, a technique I got from Josie. I wanted to quit already but how could somebody quit in the middle of nowhere, where vehicles would never pass the area?(that would be a suicide!)

Then we reached a small sitio chapel at last. I could feel we were nearer. Somebody asked a kid if how far the highway was, he answered “Layo pa”. So how far is far for a kid living on a mountain? It must be reeeeeeeeally far. (What the heck!). We waited everyone in our group to arrive at the chapel, then had some few picture-taking, before we proceeded.

We were following clay-made steep stairs again. (I am losing my breath! Swear!) Luckily what seemed “layo pa” to the kid was not that far to what we expected. After walking so far earlier, changed our concept of how far is far. A few minutes later, I never expected what I would see next. The feeling was unexplainable, seeing the whole city right before my eyes after the tiresome trekking, hiking, and walking. It was like utmost happiness sort of feeling. Like a child getting her most awaited gift. And after that we were all like just Wena, walking in the park, on our way to the main road. We could now talk a lot and laugh while walking. 

We exited at La Tegola around 3:00pm and stayed for a while on a canteen/cafeteria beside the main road going to Tops. Anything ice-cold was all we were looking for. Then we gathered and briefed that it was our end destination and we can now go home. So after a few picture-taking, we crossed the street and waited for a ride. Luckily, a dump track passed by, so we took a hitch up to JY Mall. Willyn was changing her clothes in the CR (baho kayo nga CR ingon si tikol) and was almost left behind.

Indeed, the activity was so much fun and adventure that we deserve a price for ourselves:HALO-HALO FIESTA at Chowking!(bahalag yagit mi og porma) Yummy! =)

Note: 
By the way,our trash bags were left behind by Tikol while climbing the boulders. He had two options: TRASHBAG or LIFE?! Thanks to some COAT guy who picked-up our mess. =)

With regard to our expectations, it might have not met those thing that we expected, but it has given us more of what we had asked for.. AN EXPERIENCE OF A LIFETIME! 
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