I did a poor job planning my Q4 vacation and missed my dream vacation. For the last time: Yes, work got in the way. But I am not about to spend the rest of 08 beating myself senseless for that. In fact, I took a couple days and the weekend off to see the big north--Luzon. A mini-vacation before I take the big annual when business reviews are done for the year. It didn't take much convincing from Ady and Jungkay. I practically volunteered to tag the instant Vigan was mentioned. What better timing than right after I bought my first SLR. I'm in it for the chance to do practice shots... Rookie photographer out to play!

The Ride
After an hour flight from Cebu to Manila and 4 hours by overnight bus to Baguio, the Yovi's and I geared up to head further north. Unfortunately, not as ready as we imagined. The 5:00AM Partas bus had a flat tire so we were already 40 minutes behind. A couple of hours later, we realized that what we thought was only going to take 4 hours was in fact going to take 7 (count them, seven) hours to Laoag! We finally got there around 1 in the afternoon. Note that at this point, unlike the other two, I had already spent more than half a day with my butt on a plane/bus seat. We took a tricycle ride to another terminal to take a "shuttle" ride to Pagudpud, our first stop. The "shuttle" was a cross between a huge jeepney and a small scale bus. It has obviously seen better days--probably during WW2--and Jungkay anticipated that this was going to run at dial-up speeds. To my surprise and amusement, it was the best ride I had the past 14 hours. The shuttle covered 95km in 1.5 hours, despite several passenger pick ups and drop offs. It was non air-conditioned, so we had the luxury of feeling the fresh cool Ilocos breeze.

The sights were awesome. Nax was right about everything... especially the windmills. I've only seen these in the movies. Kangkang Windmills - the first commercial wind farm in Southeast Asia. They stand like white colossal "electric fans"-as the tryke driver called them-against the perfect blue sky backdrop.

The Laoag-Pagudpud Shuttle

Bangui Bay Wind Powermills.


Pagudpud - Ilocos, Norte