It’s been awhile since my last post. I have now moved my blog to a new server. I was finally able to move my WordPress files from our old test package in the office to my own test package today. I was supposed to migrate the files last Christmas during the Holidays but the Internet connection was really slow during that time due to the Taiwan earthquake last December 26 that damaged and disconnected undersea cables. (Internet connection is still slow right now but it’s much better compared to the previous 2 weeks).

I thought it was going to be complicated moving the database and files to the new server but it was actually pretty easy. Following the instructions here how to move a WordPress blog to new domain name and server I was able to get it running within an hour without any problems.

I have now moved my files to http://wantet.com/blog from http://tet.1and1-cebu.com/blog. My other domains, wantet.com and wantet.info, have now also been updated to redirect to http://wantet.com/blog.

We’re now back in Kota Kinabalu City after we successfully summitted Low’s peak, the highest peak in Mt. Kinabalu, yesterday early morning around 6:11 am. It was more difficult than what we expected. We took the Mesilau trail and our 1st day took us 9 hrs. to get to Laban Rata where we spent the night before summitting to Low’s peak early morning yesterday.

I’ll post details of the climb as well as pictures of the climb once I get back to Cebu on Sunday.

We’ll be staying here in Kota Kinabalu city until tomorrow, Friday, Nov. 17. We’ll just probably be going around the city looking for some pasalubong to bring home as travelling around Sabah is quite expensive..costing RM 20 or around PhP270 per person to go on long distance travel by taxi.

I would like to visit Tunku Abdul Raman (TAR) Park today but it seems that my 2 other friends are not so keen anymore of going there ‘cuz of the expenses. They’re more interested in shopping and checking out the shops around KK.

We will be heading back home to the Philippines tomorrow afternoon (1420). Hopefully the weather will be great. We certainly don’t want to get stranded again as we’re running out of money here in KK…hehe!

Just one more week to go and I’m off to Kota Kinabalu. After 8 months of waiting it’s finally drawing near. I’m definitely very excited. I’m hoping and praying that everything’s going to work out as planned.

This is what I’ve been waiting for the whole year. This is going to be my 1st out of the country trip and not only that we’re set to climb Mt. Kinabalu, the highest mountain in Southeast Asia at 4,095 m.

It’s a Birthday treat for myself – something I truly deserve. Initially I wanted to conquer Mt. Kinabalu to make a point to someone. That motivation is still there but more than that I want to climb Mt. Kinabalu for myself. It’s kinda fitting that I’ll be climbing the day after my 27th birthday.

Smiling Masskara
Photo by wantet.

Masskara is a combination of two words – the English word mass meaning many or multitude and the Spanish word kara which in English means face. Masskara is also the dialect for the English word “mask”.

Every October Bacolod City, also known as the City of Smiles, celebrates the Masskara Festival. The festival’s highlight is the streetdancing which is held on the weekend nearest to the City’s Charter day on October 19.

Dancers wearing colorful costumes and smiling masks parade down the streets and dance to a Latin beat theme song. Unlike the Sinulog Festival (which is held in Cebu every 3rd Sunday of January) wherein there is live beating and playing of the drums the Masskara festival is different.There is no live beating and playing of the drums instead huge speakers are set up in the side of streets of the parade route. All contingents dance to the same beat from start to finish.

Masskara
Photo by wantet.

The Masskara parade route is much shorter compared to Sinulog parade route. I’m sure this is a very welcome idea for the dancers however since the route is much shorter the crowd is not spread out and there is a tendency for the streets to be really overcrowded.

This was the 2nd Masskara festival I attended. The first time I saw it was in the year 1999, 6 yrs. ago. During that time it wasn’t that crowded compared to this year’s festival. It shows how the festival has grown since then. Visitors from other parts of the country as well as foreigners came to see the Masskara festival.

Souvenir Masskara
Photo by wantet.

I don’t usually buy souvenir items as they as they would just end up as junk in my room but I can’t help buying one for myself a masskara souvenir item. I just found it pretty cool to bring home. The masskara souvenir items were a big hit not only to foreign tourists but as well as to local tourists. They come in different colors and sizes. The smaller ones can be bought at around PhP50 while medium sized ones can be bought from PhP8-120. Bigger souvenir masks are sold as high as PhP500.

In my opinion there are still lot of things that needs to be improved to make the festival more interesting and organized but the essence why the festival is being celebrated should not be forgotten. The Masskara festival is a celebration and declaration that despite all the hardships the Bacolodnons have faced and will face in the future they will survive and succeed in the end.

More Masskara photos can be found in my Flickr site

St. Teresa de Avila
Photo by wantet.

Last Sunday woke up at about 9am and received a text message from Maning inviting me for a photoshoot in Talisay for their Halad Festival. It’s been awhile since I was last able to shoot so I was pretty excited to join him. I got out of bed and prepared myself. We met up at JY square mall before heading out to Talisay.

We arrived in Talisay city around 11am and had to walk in the SRP to get to their City Hall where the celebration was going to be held. The City Hall was kinda quiet when we arrived. We asked some vendors who were setting up their stalls and learned from them that the parade was not gonna start until 2pm.

An offering for St. Theresa
Photo by wantet.

It was almost 12 noon and we were hungry from all the walking we did. We decided to have lunch in Gaisano Tabunok and we were in time for the parade when we finished our lunch. We headed to the church where the parade was starting. The dancers of the different contingents were already converging in the church grounds and starting to prepare for the streetdancing.

There were only about 8 or 9 contingents taking part in the streetdancing. From the Church they danced their way to the Talisay City Hall passing by SRP. Each contingent then presented in front of the crowd in the City Hall grounds.

Halad Festival Finale
Photo by wantet.

Aside from the dancing there was also an Inasal Parade. Talisay City is known for it’s tasty lechon thus the Inasal Parade. Lechon, in different sizes and costumes were paraded. One that particularly caught my attention was the lechon being paraded in a stretcher with a dextrose. It was pretty hilarious. The emcee of the program commented that there’s no longer any need to worry about getting high blood for eating lechon as now it’s the lechon who’s being hospitalized. LOL!

The festival ended with some fireworks. The Halad Festival is not a big celebration like the Sinulog and the organizing commitee still needs to do a lot of work to make the festival more organized and interesting in the next coming years. Anyhow what’s important is the reason why the festival is being celebrated which is an offering for St. Theresa de Avila the patron saint of Talisay City.

One more week to go and we’re off to Bacolod City for the Masskara festival. I’m definitely very excited about it. It’s been 4 months since I’ve last travelled outside of Cebu and it’s been over a month since I’ve been out of town. The last time I went out for a trip was when we accompanied Jan’s family to Kawasan last month.

I haven’t taken any shots lately too. I’m itching to shoot again. I hope the weather’s going to be just fine next weekend. This is just going to be my 2nd Masskara Festival and the last time I witness it was still last 1999 during the MFPI mid-year Fed Climb which was held in Negros Occidental during the Masskara week. I look forward shooting lots of pictures during the festivities.

Another thing why I’m looking forward for the trip is that my friends in the office will be coming along. Maal, Sherill, Xenia and Ces will be joining me for this trip. Most of the time when I visit Bacolod I’m usually on my own so this is going to be something different.

This is the 3rd time I’ll be visiting Bacolod City for this year and my last travel outside of Cebu was also Bacolod last June. I hope that my upcoming visit will finally give me the closure that I’ve always wanted. This is the main reason why I’m coming to visit the place again this month. The Masskara festival is only a bonus for me…something to keep me pre-occupied and entertained during my stay in Bacolod.

I hope I’ll finally get the answers to my questions so I can finally move on…

Yes, it’s finally October! September was a difficult and unfortunate month for me. I didn’t really do much the past month and getting amoebiasis was such a pain for me.

I’m glad October is finally here and I’ve got things to look forward to. I’ve got a series of activities lined up. I’m looking forward checking the Masskara festival again together with my officemates. Then a week after the Masskara it’s going to be the Mid year Fed climb in Mt. Apo. I’m not sure yet if I can go but I’m really hoping and praying i’ll be able to go. I’de like to make this as my preparatory climb before our Mt. Kinabalu climb on November. Then the week after Mt. Apo, Chai’s team will be going to Bohol and I’m also hoping I’de be able to go. Then the weekend after Bohol I’m off to Kota Kinabalu.

The next few weeks is going to be jampacked for me but i’m not complaining. I think the next few weeks is going to pretty exciting for me. This is what I want. Travel after travel…adventure after adventure, fun after fun.

Dangerous Curves
Photo by wantet.

I was having difficulty deciding whether to go to Dapitan for Kuya Arvin’s birthday or go to Daan Bantayan with Chai’s team. I wanted to go to both places even if I wasn’t feeling very well during those days.

I packed up my things with a thought of going to both places. I thought that if I won’t like Daan Bantayan I’de return back to the city and take a boat bound for Dapitan at 10pm.

Around 7am I went to the office to meet up with the rest of Chai’s team. We then proceeded to the North Bus Terminal to catch a bus bound for Kawit, Medellin. We were able to leave the Bus terminal almost 9:30am as we had to wait for Harold who still went home to Lapu-lapu.

Popoy already informed me that the trip was going to last for almost 4 hours before arriving in Kawit. I didn’t really thought it was going to take that long but it did. We arrived in Kawit past 1pm.

Kawit Medellin

We proceeded to a resort in Kawit that Popoy had booked but we realized the resort was a li’l expensive for our limited budget so we decided to transfer to a resort in Paypay, Daan Bantayan.

The resort that we stayed in Paypay was way better in Kawit at a much lesser price. We had the whole place all to ourselves. The place had 2 bedrooms (1 room with a/c), a kitchen with stove and refrigerator and an outside cottage all for PhP1600. I think it’s a pretty good bargain.

Seeing the beach and the long shoreline in Paypay I immediately got excited. It was past 3pm when we were able to finally settle down. I decided not to go Dapitan anymore as I was tired from the long trip and I haven’t explored the place yet. Another reason was that I was wary of travelling alone as I was not feeling a 100%.

Paypay, Daan Bantayan

While the others were trying to catch some sleep I started taking pictures of the scenery while trying to wait for the sunset to come. As the sunset arrived I was certainly not dissapointed. The colors were just beautiful and sun looked magnificent. My officemate, Maal, willingly posed for me and it was indeed such a good idea. I just love the silhoutte shots as it looked more interesting compared to just the plain sunset shot with only the sun.

Sunset

The fun didn’t there in fact it was just starting! The next day we went on an island hop to Gibitngil Island. The island is right across Kawit, Medellin which is a private island from what I was told by my Mom. As soon as we arrived in the island I just fell-in-love with the place. The water was crystal clear, the sand was white and the waves were just a thrill. We were like kids playing and riding with the waves. I never had so much fun in the beach as much we did in Gibitngil Island. The heat was scorching hot but nobody cared about it. Everybody was having a lot of fun in the island. We even forgot that we still had not eaten any lunch.

Around 2:30pm we left the island and headed back to Paypay to have our very late lunch. After arriving back in the resort we ate our lunch, took a shower then started packing up our things. It was almost 6pm when we left the resort and headed back home to the city.

I certainly did not have regrets coming to this trip. It was a lot of fun and full of adventure. I certainly would like to come back to this place again

More pictures in my Flickr site

It’s feels good to be back trekking again. My body is sore and aching from the climb but not an ounce of regret. I’ve never enjoyed hiking as much as I did last weekend. I felt I’ve been energized again.

I terribly missed trekking and going on an adventure. Like what I mentioned in my previous post it’s all been work for me the past few weeks and I was getting bored. I was itching to do some physical activity and adventure to inject some life into me.

So here’s a brief summary of the trek last weekend:

August 5, 2006 (Saturday)
1300-1400 – wait at South Bus Terminal for Freedom and the rest of the gang
1430-1640 – travel by bus from South Bus Terminal to Dalaguete
1700-1740- travel by habal-habal from Dalaguete main highway to Nong Isar’s place
1750 – started hiking from Nong Isar’s place to Osmeña peak. The sun was already setting down so I took snapshots of the sunset while hiking to the base camp.
1810 Рarrive at Osme̱a peak base camp
1920 – ate dinner
2100-2430 – Socials and party

August 6, 2006 (Sunday)
0610 – woke up
0630-0700 – took some pictures at the peak
0700-0800 – prepared breakfast and packed lunch
0800-0900 – ate breakfast
0900-1030 – break camp, group picture
1030-1230 – start trekking to 1st water source
1230-1340 – lunch at 1st water source
1340-1600 – trek to Kawasan Falls
1600 – arrive at Kawasan main source
1630-1700 – had some snacks
1700-1730 -swimming at Kawasan
1730-1745 – change clothes and prepared going home
1745-1815 – hike from Kawasan Falls to Matutinao highway
1815-1840 -wait for bus
1840-2100 – travel by bus and left for Cebu City
2130 – Home Sweet Home

I’m quite excited for this weekend’s cross country hike from Mantalongon, Dalaguete to Kawasan Falls in Badian. From Eastern Cebu will be heading to Western Cebu.

It’s just a minor climb but I definitely miss hiking and going in an adventure. The last time I hiked was last April when we climbed Mt. Kitanglad in Bukidnon. I definitely need a diversion. It’s been all work for me the past few weeks.

The Mantalongon-Kawasan Cross Country hike is an annual activity in our club. This is the first minor climb for our new applicants in the club after the BMC (Basic Mountaineering Course). The first time I made the Mantalongon-Kawasan Cross Country Hike was in the year 1999 when I was still an applicant of the USC-Mountaineers and since then I’ve only missed it once. The only time I missed it was in 2004 when I went to Malapascua instead of joining the climb.

I’m looking forward taking a lot of pictures this time. I already had my digicam last year but I only got a 16MB of memory ( I only had the memory card that came along with the camera) so I wasn’t able to take a lot pictures. It’s been raining the past few days I just hope the weather will be fine today and tomorrow. I hope the sky will be clear during the hike.