Mt. Pulag

It had been almost a month since my last trekking trip and I was itching to go on another trek. A chance meeting with an old pal in Manila, put me onto a number of websites and groups based in Philippines that covered trekking and trails. One of these groups was Trail Adventours which happened to be doing an overnight camping trip to Mt. Pulag that weekend.
Mt. Pulag, at 2922m above sea level, is the highest peak in Luzon and the third highest in the Philippines. The climb to Mt. Pulag passes through some amazing trails that cut through the rainforest. Generally the dry months of March to May are the best time to go there, though the trails are open all year round.
Trail Adventours is one of the few groups that organize regular monthly trips up Mt. Pulag. Generally due to the time taken to get there, the trip is done with an overnight stay at one of the camp sites on the mountain.
We needed to actually get a lot of gear for the trip. I had unfortunately left a lot of my trekking gear back in India (bags, hydration bags, sleeping bags, trekking poles, mess kit etc) and so was faced with the prospect of buying everything anew here. Luckily however we could rent out most of stuff and we ended up renting sleeping bags and a tent for the trip. A second expense was getting some warm clothing for the cold up there. Since I had assumed that the climate in the Philippines would generally not be too cold, I hadn’t packed any warm clothes. So I ended up buying a few gloves, warm jacket etc for the trip. (Though word of advice, if you intend to go up Mt. Pulag you can buy all this at quite reasonable prices at the DENR centre)
So with all our gear bought and rented, we set off to the meeting point at the Pasay Victory Liner Station. There we met Ace, who would be one of our guides on the trip. The bus left from Manila for Baguio at about 10:30 PM. We reached Baguio at about 05:30 in the morning on Saturday. Here we met the rest of our group and our second guide for the trip, Bianca.
From Baguio, we caught a “Monster” Jeepney for the long 5 hour ride to the DENR centre and then to the Ranger station. The road was long and winding, twisting and turning by the hills and mountains (Those prone to motion sickness may want to take additional care here). A lot of people chose to have a thrilling ride atop the Jeepney as well.
After about 3-4 hours we reached the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) for registration and a quick briefing on the trek. We were treated to a short video on the micro-environment of Mt. Pulag and introduced to the various flora and fauna of the region including the cloud rats.
After this we picked up lunch and began the gruelling trip uphill to the Ranger station over unfinished roads. In fact there was even a stretch where the Jeepney refused to go any other further and had to be pulled up the hill by another vehicle!!
As the road to the Ranger station was not finished we had to trek for about 1 km to the ranger station. We had initially decided against hiring a porter to carry our tent and additional gear. But after huffing and panting up the short uphill climb, we decided to hire one.
After handing over the tent, sleeping mats, my tripod and extra water to the porters we began the long climb up. The trail actually was only moderately difficult with the climb not having that steep a gradient. In about 45 minutes we reached the first rest point which was the first camp site. We rested a bit there and then began climbing again.
After about 2 hours of climbing through the jungle, we reached the second camp site. Here we rested by our tent and began setting up things for the night. The temperature had already begun to fall and darkness was also falling. The sun set in the distant horizon staining the dark sky with red.
In some time we had a quick dinner of Pork Adobo and Rice along with some vegetables. The food was quite good, in spite of being cold. After dinner we retired to our tents hoping to come out in some time. However, this was not to be as it started raining outside with a brilliant display of thunder and lightning.
The next morning we awoke at about 03:00 am as planned to a biting cold welcome. We quickly got out of our tents and began the final summit “assault”. It was still dark and we had to climb up using our head lamps. The hill side was dotted with spots of light from the head lamps of trekkers, like many fireflies in the dark. After about two hours of climbing we finally made it to the top of Mt. Pulag.

Sunrise at Mt.Pulag

Usually one can see a breath taking sea of clouds from the top of Mt. Pulag. But I guess because of the rains last night, we were not to see this spectacle. Instead we were treated to a glorious sunrise, with the Sun rising over misty mountains. Truly breathtaking.
After some time and many photos later we clambered down the mountain to the base camp for some breakfast. After breakfast, we broke camp and began the descent down to the Ranger station. The descent was quite quick and we were on our journey back by around lunch time.
We soon reached Baguio by around 6:00 in the evening. Catching a late 09:30 pm bus, we finally made our way back to Manila, carrying with us unforgettable memories of the climb and memories of many new people that we met on the trip.