IFUGAO | Banaue Rice Terraces

Thursday, August 02, 2012

The cold midday breeze blasting through our faces was not telling of the current time; it was almost twelve noon yet it felt like it was six in the morning. We were on roof of a jeepney, zigzagging up the Nueva Vizcaya-Ifugao-Mountain Province road on our way to the famous Banaue viewpoints in Ifugao.

Our first stop was the Dayanara View Point; pretty strange title for an Ifugao viewing deck if you ask me. The place was named, as you probably guessed by now, after the famous beauty queen Dayanara Torres. The Puerto Rican stunner had a photo shoot at the deck and the locals promptly titled it after her, very Filipino right?

The view here is fantastic. I had been to this place a few months before and it was not as verdant with rice plantings as it is now. There’s a stone path leading down to the terraces if you want a closer experience with the terraces.

Along the stones steps one can also see a series of massive waterfalls cascading down from the mountains. Our guide says these wonders can also be trekked from our location if one so wishes.

Of the multiple viewing decks of the Banaue Rice Terraces, the grandest view can be seen from the Main View Point. It is an understatement to say that the view here is breathtaking.

The terraces endlessly run through the mountainsides as far as the eye can see. It is quite hard to fathom that all of these are made without modern tools two thousand of years ago by our ancestors. Its massive scale simply boggles the mind.

After a few hundred clicks from our cameras and a thousand oohs and aahhs, we were presented with an ending unique only to this part of the Philippines; a bike race, but definitely not your ordinary one.

Handcrafted engineless wooden bikes paraded and zoomed down the highway. Everything is made of wood, even the wheels. These mountain bikes have no pedals and depend only on gravity to move them.

The front of the bikes are usually adorned with very intricate designs; dragons, roosters, boars, monkeys, elephants, horses; every one of them painstakingly carved by hand.

It’s interesting to note that the Banaue Rice Terraces, the very same one depicted at the back our printed currency is not a part of the designated UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Ifugao. This is in part to the numerous modern settlements now found on some parts of the area. It however does not lessen the beauty and grandness of the most popular Rice Terraces in the whole of Ifugao province.



Banaue View Point 
Address: Nueva Vizcaya-Ifugao-Mountain Province Road, Banaue, Ifugao 

GPS Coordinates: 16.90721,121.065012
Click to view location on Google Maps

THE IFUGAO HERITAGE WARRIOR CARAVAN RUN IS A FIVE-DAY FAMILIARIZATION TOUR OF THE IFUAGO ORGANIZED BY PHILTOA

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11 comments

  1. ang cool nung bike nila .. astig !

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  2. Wow, it's been a while since my last visit to your blog. And now it's more than amazing. Look at the photos. The first one is definitely a calendar material. Thanks for your contributions to make my net life more meaningful through your well-taken images.

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  3. nice photos, the rice terraces are a sight to behold. i gotta ask, how the hell those men in "bahag" endure the cold weather in such clothing. ang hard core nila grabe.

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  4. Looks better now. Great work from our government. =)

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  5. great shot of the nature and its people, I LOVE THE LAST PIC, relaxed but spirited, nice :)

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  6. Ang cool ng Bisikleta:) this place is in my top list of destinations. Never been to any part of north luzon-hopefully this year:)

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  7. Ang taray ng bisikleta at ang Macho ni kuya pernes!

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  8. Kulatipot, Traveling Morion
    Astig talaga! Handmade!

    Lag alag
    Thanks! Glad to see you back here :)

    Marjorie Gavan
    Haha siguro sanay na lang talaga sila :P

    Tin
    Ifugao's terraces are one of our country's best places to visit, let's hope it gets the attention it deserves :)

    Tatayjoni
    Thanks! Sweet diba :P

    Juanderfulpinoy
    Haha ka-machohan talaga napansin :P

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  9. great storytelling with these images you captured, it had me reminiscing visits up there when i was a kid.. :)

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  10. I also dream of visiting this fame destination of Luzon... Kahit next year ok lang, kahit malayo! 'Loved your pictures as usual, they're clear, bright and color-rich.

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  11. Rian
    Wow that must have been a long time ago!

    Ian
    Just time your visit during harvest season para green na green lahat :)

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