Rice Terraces in Banaue

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Before I leave the Philippines, I really want to see more of the country. There is so much variety, and over 7,000 islands…how can I choose? Well, since I just spent 9 months living on a beach and diving, I can safely say that, while it would be nice to dive in more places around the Philippines and be a beach bum forever, I want to see what else there is to offer. That being said, I decided to head north of Manila to North Luzon, in the Cordillera mountain region, which extends to the northern most point of the Philippines. This is mountain country, the place of ancient rice terraces and headhunting tribes that still linger in the foothills. How could I not be interested in mountains that stretch for miles and hand tools made with human jawbones?


The journey began with an eight-hour night bus ride from Manila to Banaue. I thought there would be lots of tourists on the boat (so my guidebook lead me to believe) but there was only a few others. I ended up sitting with a French girl, Rahima, and she quickly became my travel buddy. Well, at least until I popped that sleeping pill and zonked out.


We arrived in Banaue around 7:30 in the morning. I was awake the last hour, and already I could tell the huge difference from Palawan as we snaked around giant mountains and I saw houses and towns perched

on cliffs with cement scaffolding. Rahima and I found a guesthouse to share and took a nap – those pills take a while to wear off!


After a lunch at the canteen, we hired a tricycle to take us up to the rice terrace viewpoint. The mud-walled terraces were created over 2,000 years ago by the Ifugao, a tribe of fearsome head-hunting warriors. They developed a complex irrigation system involving bamboo tubes and mud channels to deliver water to the terraces. I had seen some rice

fields in Korea and in Palawan, but my mind was boggled as I stared at the vast terraces stretching down the mountain side and around the corner. We walked a path into the terraces and explore a bit, watching as a few workers toiled in the ankle deep water. We were the only tourists, and it was a bit odd to have a World Heritage site all to ourselves. But pretty awesome too.


We slowly made our way up (there were a lot of steps) and at the top I did a bit of shopping in the souvenir shop – the Cordillera region is famous for their weaving. There were also three old

Ifugao women dressed in full traditional garb sitting on the stool. Our tricycle drive told me it was perfectly okay to request a photo, and that a small offering of 20 pesos or so would be greatly appreciated and distributed among the three women at the end of the day. We couldn’t tell because they remained sitting, but our driver told us that all three were actually stoop-backed from all the years they worked in the fields. The women were so cheerful, and as I said “one two three” they all let out a cry similar to “Yippee!”



Banaue is a bit of a one trick town, so we spent the rest of the evening relaxing and eating a slow dinner, and fending off wannabe guides to Batad, our next stop!

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