My Fourth Climb- Mt. Daguldol

MounTrails # 4
Mt. Daguldol
Brgy. Hugom, San Juan, Batangas
Feb. 5-6, 2010
Group: Take Five Hikers

After a successful Mt. Batulao climb, our group, Take Five Hikers, led its way to a formidable climbing destination in Batangas. Brgy. Hugom in San Juan, Batangas gained its popularity to local and foreign tourists mainly because of its pristine beaches. Popularly known among its resorts is the La Luz Beach Resort. Another exciting activity to this not-so easy to reach place (rough roads and limited time of transportation for public utility vehicles make it a difficult place to go) is mountain climbing on Mt. Daguldol.
My friends (Lanie and IC) and I met the other members of Take Five Hikers (Mike and Ken) at 7-11 Buendia near LRT Gil Puyat station around 6:00 A.M on Feb. 5, 2010. We then proceeded to RRCG Bus Terminal and rode a bus bound to San Juan Public Market in San Juan, Batangas. We arrived in Petron Gas Station near San Juan Public Market at around 9:00 A.M. We immediately had our way to find a carinderia where we can have our breakfast and be able to buy foods for our lunch. After our final preparation, we rode a jeep bound to Brgy. Hugom. The jeep usually leaves the San Juan Public Market when it is already full of passengers. In our case, we left the Public Market around 10:00 A.M. We arrived in Brgy. Hugom at 10:40 A.M then we immediately secured our guide (Guide’s name: Manong Romeo) and paid necessary fees including registration fees and guide fee. We started our trek to Mt. Daguldol at 11:00 A.M.

The beginning of our trek was not easy. We trailed the beach of San Juan under a scorching heat of the sun. Aside from the dizzying heat brought by the sun, the type of the beach’s sands made our trek difficult for us, a type of sand where someone’s feet need to resist its coarseness. On the lighter side of it, the views on the beach could be treated us rewards to us. We endured that trekking for 30 minutes before we arrived in bunch of houses with lots of trees. After that very tiresome walk, we were greeted with lushes of trees and greetings from locals.
After our short rest on a nipa hut near a sari-sari store, we resumed our trek to Mt. Daguldol. We entered to a forested area of the trail. We noticed that there were so many people passing the trail to Daguldol. We later learned to Manong Romeo that he knew these people and Manong Lizardo, a popular guide in Mt. Daguldol, is his uncle.
At one point of the trail, there’s a spot where a huge rock can be found and perfect for picture taking having its background the pristine beach of San Juan. This spot also offers a relaxed feeling to everyone because of the cool wind that can be felt under a mango tree. There are some parts of the trail that exposed to the sun making it difficult to climbers and for them to have additional water intake to the body. Along the trail, Manong Romeo pointed to us the trail leading to Naambon Falls where we could have a side trip on the other day.
Our first major stop, aside from “take five” rests along the trail, was on the house of Manong Romeo at 12:30 P.M. We had our lunch here. Before our lunch, I immediately proceeded to Manong Romeo’s comfort room and be able to do a “major” thing (^_^). This “major” thing really made my stomach seemed like with full of butterflies inside that made me rushed to the comfort room (I almost ran along the trail to make it and left my companions). During our lunch, I had a short conversation with some members of Metropolitan Mountaineering Society. MMS also had their climb in Mt. Daguldol on the same date. The conversation opened me to the latest updates about their group as well as their series of planned climb for year 2010. Seeing these members made me reminisce my first climb. They cordially invited me to climb with them again and at that point, I was hoping to join them soon. Aside from the lush and clean surrounding at Manong Romeo’s place, I also noticed a bird on the cage that can be found outside Manong Romeo’s house. It has a dark color though I don’t know its name.
After our lunch, we resumed our trek at 1:30 P.M. We passed by Mang Lizardo’s house and met him. We also had a short break to a chair of bamboo underneath a huge mango tree. The views on this rest area were very relaxing. We took this break to take some pictures and resumed the trek afterwards. On another resting area, a group of kids with a horse with them carrying a load of coconuts offered us some fresh buko juice for Php 10 and we availed immediately. These coconuts were freshly picked on the other side of Mt. Daguldol and usually transported down on the trail of Mt. Daguldol using the horses as the medium of transportation.
At 3:25 P.M, we were able to reach the campsite near the water source. The views from the campsite were beautiful and even so at the time of sunset. We took a lot of pictures! ^_^.

At dinner time, we noticed a lot of fireflies. This was the only climb and mountain where I encountered such numbers of fireflies. There were so many of them that I indulged myself to some firefly watching. Some fireflies even got to my clothes. I really enjoyed that moment. They say that fireflies are evidence that the air on that place can be considered clean. Aside from fireflies, the starry night and crescent moon up on the sky made our trek truly worth the sweat. That night was also cold but not as cold as what we had experienced in Pico. Before we sleep, we secured our foods, hang them in the trees, for there were dogs that usually snapped foods from the climbers.

We had our wake-up call at 6:00 A.M of Feb. 6, and immediately took some pictures of sunrise. After we had our breakfast, we then breakcamp at around 7:30 A.M and started our trek down to jump-off at around 8:00. On our way down, we encountered a group of locals. They greeted us and we greeted them also. They told us that they will visit a house on located on the side of the mountain for the traditional “pamamanhikan”. I was amazed how this tradition still observed nowadays. We visited the Naambon Falls. The waters on the falls were almost dried, mainly because of the approaching dry season (summer season) that time.
We reached the sari-sari store around 11 A.M, the same store where we had our stop over after a long trek on the beach yesterday, then had our lunch and ordered some halo-halo; delicious halo- halo. After our lunchbreak, we trekked again to the beach before we reached a stretch of small cottages after La Luz Beach Resort. We also took some pictures when we passed by La Luz. At the beach, we indulged ourselves for some dip in to the so clean beach! A very rewarding trip after a climb at Mt. Daguldol. After this very relaxing side trip in the beach, we hurriedly fixed ourselves to catch up the last jeep ride from Brgy. Hugom to San Juan Public Market at 1:00 P.M.

Kaisipan Pagkatapos ng Akyat
Ang pag-akyat sa bundok Daguldol ay kinokonsidera sa “minor level” ng mga namumundok. Datapwat sa aking pananaw, ang akyat namin sa bundok na ito ay nangailangan hindi lamang ng preparasyong pisikal kundi ng ibayo ring pag-iingat. Ang init na dulot ng paglalakad sa tabi ng dagat ay higit na nagbigay sa akin ng kondisyon na mas mahirap na paglalakad kesa sa paglalakad sa sementadong kalsada. Madalas na lumulubog ang paa ko sa buhanginan at nagdudulot rin ito ng mainit na pakiramdam sa aking mga paa. Dahil dito, ang karagdagang proteksyon sa init ng araw ay napakaimportante at ang pagpapanatili ng tamang antas ng tubig sa ating katawan. Dulot nito ay ang pangangailangan ng mas maraming tubig na dapat na baunin.


_Cory_ Oct. 31, 2010