pamitinan mountain, Philippines

Two mountains, Mt. Binacayan and Mt. Pamitinan, kissing sky side by side is collectively known as Montalban Gorge or Wawa Gorge.  It is the best and the quickest one day getaway from the chaotic life of Manila, if you love mountain hiking.

We planned to go for Mt. Pamitinan hike.

How to go:

Getting at the foothills was a smooth trip. Take a bus or taxi going to Farmer's Market, Cubao. From Cubao, there are many van's(UV Express) running to Montalban which would be approx 1.5- 2 hours ride. 

UV Express service to Montalban

From here you can take tricycle which will take you to Brgy Wawa, almost foothills of mountain.

What to carry:

We relaxed for a while at Brgy Wawa, registered at the tourism counter for just 2 PHP, made sure that we have enough food and water. 

There are few small shops around this area where you can get basic required supplies like water, snacks, bananas, coffee and even fresh cooked burger as well.

Hanging Bridge

It is better to wear flexible and relaxed attire for mountain hiking. You should also carry a set of extra clothings to change once you are back from hiking. There is arrangement to take bath with 25P charge.

You will get lot of sharp rocks on the way to summit so if you like you can carry gloves. Gloves are also available there in shops. 

On the way, sharp rocks

Altogether, my recommendation is to travel light. I carried lot of food but brought most of the food back. There are 2 junctions to stop at and rehydrate yourself, although you may need to shed some extra bucks to get water here.

It is better to start early. We reached there by 7:30AM and returned almost by 3PM. We stopped for longer period on the way. you can also reach at summit and return within 4-5 hours if you want to finish it quickly. 

It would be challenging if you start late and sun is right up on your head. We were lucky because it was a cloudy day.

It was a fun climbing up till summit. you can see few village houses once you start trekking up but after gaining little height, you will be only with nature, greeneries all around and small path to walk on. Initial impression would be that this hiking is going to be easy and fun. 

We stopped at first junction grabbed some quick drinks, coconut water etc from the shop, and a short break and then started climbing again.

We can call it phase 2 which was tough, steep height and sharp rocks and mountains all the way. 

Make sure that you are wearing nice hiking shoes or good quality shoes which can survive these rocks.

Crawling, creeping and making sure that each step is firmly placed before we move our next step because one slip would cause a definite injury. from this point finding a flat place to sit was also challenging. Palm, foot and especially bum got proper acupressure and upto an extent of acupuncture that day. 

View from Top

We were already sweating and exhausted after stage 1 when stage 2 was giving us more challenges and difficult moments but we all were enjoying this.

After a good hike we found one flat surface for our bottom. Relaxed, rehydrated we moved again. Summit was close and now everyone was eager to meet the summit, share the beauty of nature together.

Summit1

It was a breathtaking view from the summit. Cameras and mobiles flunged into action. In between my decision of wearing jeans while climbing proved to be wrong when I found good tear right at the bottom. "Pant fat gaya mountain hiking me. lol.."

Somehow I managed to escape in bush and change my pant quickly to one relaxed sports pant. 

There was one more summit at another side, even higher, was waiting to welcome us. There was only one way to climb and not much space on summit 2 so we decided to take a break again.

summit2

After sometime we climbed on summit 2 to get spectacular view from the point. It was an awesome experience. Climbing down from mountain was quick but scary since it was tough to balance and station your feet while gravity was pulling you down.

Sharp rocks were adding fun while bamboo trees on both side was quite helpful to balance.

We managed to reach back at the starting point successfully unscratched.

It took us one hour to relax take bath and have quick snacks and coffee. Tricycle, UV express and bus brought us back to home. Every muscles and bones were happily enjoying the pain of mountain hiking while mind was fresh with the close encounter with nature.