How Are You : Catanauan Cove

Sometimes, it took me months ( even over a year ) to find and reply  comments in my old posts cos I don't get to read them right away, unlike those who comment using blogger account. I would only find them when I get to revisit my old posts. Nevertheless, however late and futile already_ I still reply.



Like_ just today I found this almost a year old comment (above screenshot) in my Catanauan Cove  post. The resort post itself is already almost three years old (2010). I thought of doing a sort of update about the resort which brought me back to  my old post. There I found the comment which I replied right away.

Well, the sad part is the comment is full of disappointment about the resort and quite contrary to what I was claiming in that post. The difference is I came to visit Catanauan Cove in its earliest phase. In its almost virginal state.

Personally, I've long wanted to revisit this private resort in Bondoc Peninsula (Quezon Province). I wanted to see how it progressed since my visit in 2010 when it was still relatively undergoing construction and found it to be a paradise of a beach. If only I had not gotten negative feedback from one of my bestfriends when she & family came to experience the place last Nov. 2012. I would have had revisited it by this time. Above photo was actually hers, taken during her visit. Oh well, I stole it from her FB and the rest of the photos coming below, haha. She'll never find-out anyway. She doesn't read my blog, haha.

this infinity pool, overlooking the ocean, was not yet there during my visit. nice!




I don't remember the resort having this area either, I guess it wasn't there yet too.

But I remember there were already activities for rent like kayak even then.

From this view, seems the beach is perfectly alright..




Not quite obvious with this photo of the beach she took, the reader's comments above, echoed and reaffirmed my friend's disappointments towards the resort. She exactly told me that the water was dirty and full of jelly fishes. I actually felt a little of guilt here cos I highly recommended the place to her. Expecting that the place must be more beautiful by that time cos of added structures like the infinity pool and whatnot. My friend also added the isolation she felt with fear cos she & family was the only overnight guest that time. It was a holiday in November. They stayed in a cottage by the beach.

I feel a little sadness here cos I truly feel concerned. I was happy when I discovered that there was a high-end resort in my home province (Quezon), I also love the proximity of it from Manila and that it's only takes a short  road trip. I really thought I would come to frequent this resort on its full blast.. but well, hearing these low maintenance buzz..




I wonder why the resort can't get motivated by their tree.. imagine 130 years old and still strong and beautiful. The resort is barely three years and already maintenance is an issue. Catanauan Cove is I think going for members only when it reaches its full capacity and temporarily open to the public.

Sad :(

Busay

Can't still have a good grasp of it # the mighty sun has been playing so elusive since the first of August, had given  Manila daily burst of massive rain, not less than 3 typhoons, torrential/monsoon serious flood BUT!! yesterday 'till today_  the sun has been up and shining !!!! Are you kidding me?? After I had cancelled two scheduled trips for this month, now you're giving me this " beautiful beach weather". Nohurtfeelings. I heard another typhoon is coming, so really I'm just happy to wake-up with the sun beaming at me, which is a rarity now a days.

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I'm just saying.. my last out of town was as old as the last time a whole week the sun continued to show. As far as I can remember, that was like sometime in June this year. Cos after that, it has been all raining and just small peeking of the sun, and the only place I've been to were malls' supermarkets to buy groceries. then stayed home under roof being hammered by the heavy downpour of the rain_everyday!

Sometime in June, we had our short visit of my hometown and before exiting, we decided to eat our lunch at one of the countless waterfalls/river resorts a little bit away from the town.

See how cheap the entrance fees are.

From that opening, we walked and passed some houses, really rural. I enjoyed some rustic scenes like the kid bathing himself in a basin. He didn't care at all about a bigger body of water just across his house which was the resort we were going. Or maybe, he had too much of it already.

Few feet across that little boy in the basin, there was this man made small bridge with water flowing on it.

It wasn't a pass thru bridge where one can walk to reach the other point. It was more it seemed a water container. Unseen from the photo above, there were couples of women washing clothes right at this spot. Making use of the free flowing water. This also served as the entrance of the resort.



From up there, we went down and this what caught us in surprise. One solid massive rock with water flowing happy. For P20 entrance fee, where could you steal such a nature treat, if not in gifted rural town such as Guinayangan Quezon.

We couldn't help ourselves and went straight up to the rock.

The water was coming from the river behind the rock. I wasn't so solved about the staircases. They lessen the rustic appeal of the falls and made them looked  man made. In fairness, they made going around the falls real easy.



Neither the painted stairs appealed to me.



That time, the resort was relatively had just opened for business. We also caught some locals having photo shoot for the beauty contest of their barangay fiesta.

The place spelled nature kiss. We almost forgot why we dropped by there. Not to swim! We didn't bring any swimwear.

But to eat our packed lunch!!! We weren't asked to pay for the cottage since were just there to eat and not to swim. Yah, I looked funny there,haha,



Nothing could beat a nature stop when you're up for a long road trip (like 5-6 hours) back to the tiresome city.

Hits & Misses

I'd say the best things in life are free. And random. The sweetest experiences I had_ mostly came unannounced and happened unplanned. Talk about free spirited people like me, you wouldn't have to wonder.
Ofcourse, a coin has two sides. My randomness is not always a happy ending. My being a snappy traveler also  brought us some random misses, haha.

Okey, I'll share a very graphic example of my randomness. One after-a-rain-noon, we were on our way back to Manila from a short visit of my farfar away hometown. But before we even got out of the town, brother mentioned that we were about to pass by a barangay with a cave he recently visited. In fact he added it was just like 10-15 minutes away a little detour from the main road. My random bell rang so loud, I went ahead to persuade driver husband to entertain the detour, haha. To cut the long convincing scene _  we reached the rural outskirts and all we needed was to change our foot gears cos we would be doing a little hiking.



Not so fast my dear! My ever protected/conservative/opposite of my random- self husband had to make his bylaws speech first as usual. This time with my brother around, he was letting us go without him. He actually not so liking this kind of snappy trip and would only go with us to protect us.



Afterwhich we were ready, but wait.. brother had an issue_ he totally forgot how to get there! wt#@%#!!!

So now we had to look for a local guide. He then went to a house nearby and when he came back, he brought with him our guide___



Meet little Angelito :))) The boy volunteered or was it like he was sent by his mother to guide us to the cave. The boy swore he knew the cave so well it was one of his play areas in the neighborhood. Ahh, ok.

So we followed the little boy leads. He said that it was just very near from the main road where we started the hike. He was so right about the cave not so far. Only this young fellow forgot to warn us that it wasn't going to be as plain as the beginning.







It was not at all obvious in the photos above, but the trail was actually not made easy by the previous rain that day. It was muddy and slippery. Many times, we couldn't hold to anything but to thin twigs only which were not very helpful. I guess the situation limited brother (who was behind the lens) on taking photos of our trail. It wasn't only once that we nearly fell down the river below the hilly muddy road we were walking on. It's good husband never read my blogs. The secret is safe from his worries.



The boy was right, it wasn't that far. Really, just few minutes and difficult muddy trail from the mainroad. Brother was not convinced that it was the cave he was looking for.



The boy insisted that this was the one! Brother was sure_it was not!!

You decide who's right ! This was the cave the boy-guide said it was! haha.



To give you a better perspective of the size of the mouth of the cave_  how do you think I could fit in to enter thaT?? crawl !!! haha.

The boy swore it was a cave and people in their community went in to catch some___... now I forgot what! Not snake, I'm sure of that.



Brother was so sure it wasn't the one. The boy out of embarrassment  ran out of the woods and left us all by ourselves to trek back to the main road. wheeww!!

All ended well in laughter and well as usual as I say to my girls__ charge it to experience!!!

Fiesta 2012

Happy 

Fiesta

Guinayangan

Quezon !!!!

aww, i missed it again :(

see more of my beautiful hometown
 flourishing with eco-tourism potentials
here




or

experience it through my Guinayangan holiday posts :

railroad skates
karnabal
hidden gems around
busay 1
beach paradise
palm trees
pasko sa amin

It's more fun to skate in the Phils.

I bet not all of you have already ridden a railroad "skates" ( I heard the locals referred to it as "iskits", reads as in our vernacular ). Don't worry, there are lots of them in the provinces of Quezon and Bicol. It's never too late to experience the quaint ride. Infact, me and my girls had our first ride only this afternoon. It was so fun!

The ride comes also with a lot of twist. Like the skates could bring you in the middle of a railroad bridge with massive body of water underneath. . now here comes the real train coming from the opposite direction. .omg! Whatodooo? Well, good news  the skates could easily be lifted off the tracks ( and wait at the side of the road for its turn ) to give way to the one coming, most especially if it's the king of the railroad approaching. Bad news if caught in the middle of a rail bridge. Where do you think the passengers and the skates would go? Jump with the skates down the river?

Well,  I just got home from a long road trip and quite sleepy already. I'll help you survive the situation when I get back to post about this interesting ride.

Tomorrow maybe.
*you can see more of the skates now here :D

Cueba Santa

 This was taken at Quezon National Forest Park in Atimonan Quezon, 3 years ago. The two girls in the picture were my daughters.The giant grotto was the latest attraction in the park then.

Fast forward to 2012, last weekend we went to visit my home town (3 hours away from this forest park) and as usual we made a pit stop there. While having lunch, I saw a tarpaulin with photos of sight seeing packages the town of Atimonan offered. I was surprised that there were lots. Falls, caves beaches, mountain treks, to name some. Hmmm, in heaven I was! Ofcourse, the opportunity was there, I grabbed! haha.
To cut the story short, we availed a guided trekking tour, initially to Cueba Santa and later ( I'll tell you why) to Pinagbanderahan Peak. It was so random, you would see how physically unprepared we were. On our 3 for 100 slippers we faced the challenge ;).

The best thing was the trail commenced right then and there. . at the foot of the mountain where the grotto is. We begun the trek with a prayer for safety.




Another good thing about this trail is it's somehow novice friendly and by the look of it, although it's the first time I heard about it ( excuse me, I'm no mountaineer, I'm just a mom with itchy feet:)), it sure is a road frequently traveled. There were concrete stairs which thu' already difficult for "lay men"  like us, it wasn't like the muddy mountain trails we experienced in the past little adventures we had.




Not easy, but definitely we enjoyed the scenic trail with the pouring sweat, aching muscles and all.

I particularly like the idea that they left the dead trees in their natural cementery habitat. Our guide mentioned that it's being prohibited to take away those fallen trees from that forest.

I was in love when mountainous rocks appeared in the middle of the green forest! I was thinking  maybe I was a fairy in the forest in my past life.

 If not, why I'm so happy when I'm frolicking with nature:)))

We made countless water stop...

. .yet it seemed we sweat like no amount of water could refill, haha.

We saw plenty of deep black holes created by the rock formations. Maybe down there are caves? or snakes???




For me, the rocks made the trail so much interesting.  For instance the photo above was a passing through. .

 . . reminded me so much of  the movie "The Flintstones". You know the stone age, haha.

 Until we reached our goal_ the Cueba Santa.

 Upclose, it looks like another black hole we saw a lot earlier. Omg, I was silently contemplating how on earth could we get down to that deep hole of an entrance. It was so different from the caves I've been in Bohol and Palawan.

It was pitch dark and the entrance was narrow and steep. I thought we needed some rope to rappel.

With the help of our guide, we managed to get down to the cave.

But to however my giant husband was able to squeeze himself in, I had no idea. haha.



Inside it was pitch darkness. I was behind the lens here and was actually just blind shooting.

Later I was able to adjust the aperture and somehow achieved some lights.

I wasn't sure of the exact reason for that candle lighting,for the light maybe? Later thu' when I learned from our guide the myth/history of the cave ( I will share in the ending part of this post), I thought it's more than just for the light but maybe more of spiritual intention.
Notice that the cave has been vandalized badly. Sad.




Nothing spectacular in this cave. No awesome stalagmites and stalactites. Quite small too.




Except for the story it  dwelled during Japanese invasion of our country. This I got from our trekker guide and right now I'm too lazy to google confirm it. Meet our guide "Alvin" who waited for us all to get back into fresh air, out of the cave before sharing the cave history. It has been told that a number of nuns were killed and probably molested, raped? inside the cave by the Japanese soldiers. Now, don't you think it' had been reasonable and thoughtful of Alvin not to divulge the creeping story inside the pitch dark cave? Agree?
He added, there have been instances that some rock formations reflected like nuns lining -up inside the cave. I wonder if those rock formations really exist and I just missed them or were they vandalized already and gone? Or just some apparitions seen by the chosen ones?

I thought we only reached the anterior part of the cave. There was a bigger hole there which I thought would be possibly accessible via rappelling. Maybe for the experts. Definitely not for us.

And hence the journey of getting there had been more exciting than the cave itself, we wasted no more time and exited the way we entered.




Back to the fresh air we decided to continue on to the more challenging part of the trail.

To the Pinagbanderahan Peak.
Next.
see ya.