a trip to marinduque

Nature and Heritage in Marinduque:

by: IVAN HENARES (my apologized to you if you got this column, but thank you for the information, i know this entry will helps a lot especially to all who can read this blog and for sure they might be interested to visit also our province, again sorry!)

Aside from the annual Moriones Festival during Holy Week, the island province of Marinduque hasn’t been getting a lot of attention from mainstream tourists. That makes it virgin territory for visitors, so I did a backpacking trip recently. 

From the Buendia LRT Station, we took a Jac Liner bus to the Dalahican Port in Lucena, Quezon (PHP193). Our bus arrived at the port just in time for the 2 AM departure of the ferry to the Balanacan Port in Mogpog, Marinduque (PHP125). One of our companions was left behind so he had to take the ferry to Sta. Cruz which left 30 minutes later. 

We arrived in Balanacan at about 5:30 AM. Vans were waiting outside and we took one to Sta. Cruz (PHP70) to meet up with our friend. At Sta. Cruz, we had breakfast at Rico's Inn and checked out the old church.

From there, it was a jeep to Torrijos where we took a jam-packed tricycle (there were ten of us including the driver) to Brgy. Sahi in Buenavista, the jump off point for Mount Malindig. Just look for the tricycles to Malibago and ask the driver to take you further down the road to Sahi. 

The forested volcano of Malindig, previously known as Marlanga, is located at the southern tip of Marinduque. The climb is usually 1 hour and 30 minutes. But with me around, it took 3 hours to get to the base camp which is about 900 meters above sea level. Unlike the Pico de Loro climb which was rainy, muddy but forested, the Malindig climb was scorching hot with no trees to give us any shade. But the views were fantastic such as the Tres Reyes Islands named after Melchor, Gaspar and Balthazar.

We wanted to be back down before dark so that we could pass by the Malbog Sulfur Springs so I decided to stay behind at the base camp (to speed up things and to recharge) while the rest went up the summit which is 1,157 meters above sea level. There's no view up the summit since it's covered by thick forest growth. The best view is from the base camp.

Our descent took just an hour. Back at the jump-off point, we took a tricycle to the springs in Malbog. We had to cross a small river to get to it. The group only stayed for a while since we wanted to be in Boac before it got really late.

On the way to Boac, we stopped at the town of Gasan for dinner. I was surprised to see some good places to eat. We picked an Italian-sounding restaurant called Ristorante D'l Jose which did serve pasta and a variety of American and Filipino dishes. It was value for money since I got pasta for three (the menu says good for two) for just PHP70! Everything was so cheap. We also got ourselves some tuba to drink at the beach house. 

The next day, we planned to visit the Tres Reyes Islands, which we saw from Mount Malindig. But we were just too tired and spent most of the morning resting. After lunch at the beach house, we went to the Boac town proper to check out the church.

It was a pleasant surprise as we got down the jeep to discover that Boac still has a sizeable collection of architectural heritage. I really didn't expect to see the town virtually intact, so many heritage houses and buildings! Although you could see that progress is fast setting in.

If controlled properly, Boac can become a great heritage town. The heritage district can be a showcase for the municipality and province and a potential tourist attraction if the heritage structures are protected, new buildings and development in the heritage district are controlled and regulated, and heritage structures properly restored. We went up the hill to the Boac Cathedral too.

We also got to see some morion masks in the shops. They aren't cheap though, about PHP4,500 per mask. From Boac, we took a jeep to Balanacan Port in Mogpog for the 4 p.m. ferry back to Lucena. We decided to stay at the rear end of the ferry so that we could enjoy the view. We arrived at the port three hours later and boarded a JAM Liner back to Manila.

TRY TO VISIT MARINDUQUE,,YOU'LL BE BACK FOR SURE!