On his third adventure to the second tallest mountain in the Philippines, Mt. Pulag in Benguet Province, Gutsy Tuason hijacks a pickup full of city slickers and leads them into the wild pine forests and famous grasslands of Pulag National Park

Just as I was planning a third trip to Mt. Pulag, in Benguet Province (the second tallest mountain in the Philippines), I got a call from Rogue. Nissan wanted to lend me a pick-up truck to do a story. Perfect. Am off to Pulag and, obviously, Nissan never read my other car article. If they did, there would be no way in hell that they would want to lend me a truck. Or maybe they just really wanted to put the truck to the test, and, in that case—they picked the right guy.

This wasn’t one of my usual trips. I was asked to be some sort of a guide for a group of friends who were first timers. This group of “social climbers” were comprised of Tweetie and Mon, Margot and Rene, Monchu, my mother, and my brother Sev. So, after about five drunken meetings of planning, we finally sorted out the details, nailed down a date, and set forth into the wild with Prada tents and Manolo Blahnik hiking boots.
 

May 16 
Woke up just a tad late, meeting the group at Shell NLEX at 4:30 A.M. Moved my ass into overdrive and got to the Shell station just a few minutes late. The drive up to Baguio was fine, got the Nissan Navara up to almost 180 km per hour without getting busted on the Subic/Clark highway. As we got up to Baguio, my mother had a brilliant idea of taking a shortcut through Loakan road to get to Camp John Hay, our first stop before heading to the visitor center in Kabayan, about three hours away. The shortcut didn’t quite work out because the road was closed—but I am not too good at following road signs, and as it looked quite possible to drive through, I did. The road was fine at the beginning, but as we moved on, it got worse until I had to stop. It was decision time. The road ahead was bad (if you could even call it a road), and having just read the book Blink, I went with my first instinct and decided to go for it . . . straight into a pile of soft, wet mud, hood-first. Fuck! We were knee deep in shit, and by the looks of it, the only way out was to get plucked out with one of those cargo-lifting helicopters. I got out of the car, sank knee-deep, and lost a shoe as I walked around the front of the car to see the damage. Was killing myself for my stupidity. Thank Christ for a bunch of road workers and a grader, because, after two tries, they pulled us out.

After about five drunken meetings of planning, we finally sorted out the details, nailed down a date, and set forth into the wild with Prada tents and Manolo Blahnik hiking boots.

We gave them a P2,000 tip (which they probably got smashed on booze all weekend with), and off we went to meet the rest of the guys. By the time we got to John Hay, I looked like I had already climbed Mt. Pulag. After a quick lunch, we headed for Kabayan—a Land Rover, an Expedition, and the Nissan Navara 2 x 4 on street tires. The road to the Pulag visitor center in Kabayan was fine, and it was quite scenic passing through Ambuklao Dam. At the visitor center, we met up with our “happy” guide, the legendary Ritchie Wallace, and watched the brief video on the Pulag National Park rules, etc. . . . which we, of course, followed to a T. Next phase was the drive up to the Ranger Station, just about 12 km away, but which is probably one of the roughest roads in the Philippines. It took almost two hours to do the drive, and the Nissan handled it with no problems. That was until we got to the Ranger Station, and I parked it in a patch of what might as well have been quicksand. The truck was stuck, but we were late and had to start our ascent to Base Camp 2, about two hours hike away. All our porters were ready to go, so we made last-minute equipment checks and headed off. The trail starts through a pine forest then up a steep incline, through the mossy forest, and then ends at the start of the famous Mt. Pulag grasslands. We barely made it in time to set up camp before the sun went down. The guys set the tents up, while the girls set themselves up with salami, cheese, and wine—which, of course, they shared with us later in the evening. As the sun went down, so did the temperature. We started the hike, and it was around 18ºC but, by early evening, it was down to 11°C. Our plan was to get up at 3:30 A.M., have coffee, start the ascent to the summit, and be there by sunrise. Everybody behaved themselves, and after some dinner and wine, most of us were tented up by 10 P.M. Some of us had more spacious tents than others.

The mountains with mist, the orange hues of morning light, the clouds below us and the blue skies above. Magic! 

May 17
Everybody got up in time, but since it takes a while to sort out eight people, we ended up starting the hike for the summit at around 4:30 A.M. It began as a night-hike, and gradually the sun began to light our path. Oh, and it was cold as shit—about 7°C. Looking at our group, one would think we were geared up for some place like Alaska, not the Philippines. The final hike to the summit takes between an hour to an hour and a half, and we all did it within a reasonable time. The gods were on our side, and the sunrise was, for lack of a better word, spectacular. Only pictures can come close to doing it justice—the mountains with mist, the orange hues of morning light, the clouds below us and the blue skies above. Magic! We spent an hour on the summit, shooting photos and soaking in the fresh mountain air. We headed back to Camp 2, ate a little, brokeup camp, and started the hike back to the Ranger Station.

The trek down took about two hours from Camp 2. Now, back at the ranger station, I had one more problem to sort out—my stuck in the mud Navara! So I gathered up around eight porters to shake the truck loose. It looked like a scene from a street riot. As the truck got out, there was a classic moment where the guy behind the tires (which happened to be Ritchie) got splattered with mud. Straight out of a movie, it was. The ride back down the mountain was a lot worse than going up and, I must say, nail-biting at times. But the Nissan handled it pretty good for a 2 x 4. When we got down, I was scared to look under the chassis. But, like the girl from Nissan said, put the truck to the test . . . and that’s exactly what I did. Now the plan back in Manila was for us to spend one more night in Kabayan, camped out on the property of Ritchie’s mother. But I knew after a night up at the summit, the crew would prefer to go back to Baguio or go with the other idea I had: spend the night at Mt. Data Lodge, the Hilton up in the clouds (altitude of the hotel is close to 8,000 feet above sea level). We set out after checking in at the visitor center for Data and, three hours later, we were all in heaven—showers, decent dinner, fireplace, and a bed! Oh, and some wine, of course.

May 18
Slept like a baby, had some coffee, and walked around the beautiful garden within the compound of the lodge. After a good breakfast, we headed back to Manila, but with a pit stop in Mt. Timbac to see the mummies. We stopped by Baguio for a late lunch, and finally got back to Manila at around 11 P.M. Well, some of us did. After all the shit that happened to me with the car, it was Mon’s turn. He got a flat tire just before the Subic/Clark highway, and they got home by midnight. I returned the truck the next day, tossed the keys, and said, “I gotta rush, thanks for the ride.” But I did have it detailed first. It looked good and was still running, so I guess it did survive . . . well, at least until they lend it out to the next guy.