Life in a Backpack: Baler with Journeying James

I was very tempted to join the group despite the fact that I can go to Baler without any packages, but hey it’s Journeying James we are talking about. On 23^rd of May I took an Alps bus from Sorsogon to Manila for an excruciating 12 hours. When I arrived in Manila I suffered dysmenorrhea so I texted Mitch that I might not be able to join. But at 7pm I was feeling better so I decided to still go. I wouldn’t miss this for the world. We met in Mcdonalds North Ave, I took my dinner and looked for James afterwards. After the 12 hour bus ride from Sorsogon to Manila, here I am again in the 5 hour rough van ride from Manila to Baler, I had some bruises from that ride alone.

When we arrived it was a chilly Saturday morning. We set up camp and I tried to get some sleep but failed horribly. We went to turo turo for our breakfast, I ordered tortang talong and rice.

We went back to the camp and prepared for bike town tour.

We bike our way to the Museum, there is not much to see there that I can relate to the story of Baler, just some few paintings, relics and there was even this

I asked Vianca to take a picture of me

The museum however is quite impressive, I love the bricks that composed the building, the old capiz window, and the sculptors

Some of the stuff to see there are these

And some paintings

And these scripts

We headed to church which is at that time is having a wedding ceremony so we weren’t able to go inside. We however went to Aurora’s house which I enjoyed - the car, the house itself, the jars and the bamboo stuff (Im addicted to them, just so you know).

This is the house with our bikes

One of the bamboo stuff I was telling you about

The car

The street signs, I love how old they look.

I just noticed that almost all the places in the Philippines has a Rizal St in it.

We then headed to the hanging bridge, part of going there is going through this rough road, which is quite hard for me considering the bike I am riding – no suspension and anytime soon Im scared it might break into pieces. We were greeted by these bamboo trees after the rough road riding

This is the hanging bridge, some parts need some fixing but no need to be afraid of.

The view that you get to see while crossing the hanging bridge

We went back and we ate one of the most incredible lunch ever and lie down for some time and went surfing. The waves are small to flat and since I wasn’t very good at paddling yet, it was a bit hard for me to ride. I just practiced paddling instead.

No pictures of me surfing, again hahaha but here are some of my friends

I rented the board for an hour and it was bitin!!! I just swam some more after an hour. I also played volleyball with some instructors.

Night time was “sosyals” time. What happened here stays here! But still I’m posting pictures anyway.

I was so drank that I prefer to sleep in the hammock, I didn’t know how I was able to tie it but I slept pretty well.

Sunday morning is falls day. We trek for about 45 minutes to go there, James was tasked to be the sweeper and thanks to him he patiently waited for me

Yes you are reading it right, DRINGKING WATER

A mini falls on the way.

The trek includes dipping so be prepared to get wet

Seeing this made the hell of a trek worthwhile

The water is a bit cold, and I was chilling all throughout and had a tendon strain due to tired legs and ice cold water, yet I still enjoyed this. Probably one of the highlights of the tour. Here are some pictures