Week 39 of 2017 – Masungi Georeserve

Like all the other adventures I have been in, I went to Masungi Georeserve with not much research on what to expect.

I want the experience to be entirely mine, I do not want some of people’s experience to mire mine. Ahaha! But I did ask around and know it was gonna be a good one.

And it was! It was not as difficult as I expected it to be, but it was really cool!

My favorite part is the Bayawak rope course! It was the longest, the steepest and the most tiring one. It was the last one before we ate the snacks. I was famished! I did not have lunch before going on our 11:30 AM scheduled trail and the mere fact that food was awaiting for me below that rope work made me power through it.

This is the view of the Bayawak rope course from the Tatay viewing deck, the highest point (that can be visited).

When I saw this rope course, I thought it was the one we just been through. I was like, ” Wow, we did that?!” Turned out that we were just about to conquer that.  I can’t believe how long it was.  I did not see that it was steep from here so I thought, “Yeah, okay let’s just do that. Madali lang naman ung mga yun.” I was wrong.  It made me think twice before going through it. I do not have fear of heights, or anything. I am just not prepared to meet my Maker.

This is Bayawak from the top of the course. It didn’t feel safe, there was no harness and the park ranger is less than 100 lbs.

If you’ve conquered this, you could say you have lived life on the edge. Really.  We were so high up and when you start the descent, there is no safety harness. Heck, there’s no sense of safety at all.  Our park ranger, the beautiful 100-lbs woman in green shirt in the photo above, was your only hope for safety. How? Well, she tells you to hang on tighter.  Safe, right? YES! We all gone down Bayawak safe and sound! Galing! Saya!

I was resting while taking their photo

It was tiring. I did not feel the burn on my arms, but I did feel it the following day. After i got at the bottom, I laid down on the rope and started taking photos of their suffering! Ahaha!

There was a tuna sandwich (at that point, I was just imagining that it was a whopper burger), banana and calamansi juice waiting for us about 50 meters from here.  It was wrong for us to go through this with empty stomach. I burn about 800 calories the entire trek. We should have loaded on proteins and carbs because it was a long course.  I should have gone for that McDo meal or shawarma. Oh well!

That Bayawak course was the last one but we went through that popular web thing, too.

One too many shots on this? But the view from this is AWESOME

Taken from below Sapot ni Ric (maybe a longer shot, huh? I did not have enough space, lest I’d fall off the face of the earth)

More webs?

There were some caving action

Times like this when there are low lying rocks overhead, the helmets really come through (they smell though, the helmet)

You must not only get your legs ready, but also your arms, from all the pulling and pushing from all the ropeworks

Masungi Georeserve is home to wildlife. And typically of Filipino homes, you must enter with clean feet. They make you wash off mud off your shoes before you step on the WHITE ropes

It brings you good vibes when you are surrounded by His picturesque work.  You point your camera anywhere and it would give you a good view.  It was a good experience too.  We are very thankful to our patient and wonderful park ranger.

Not only our guide, she doubles as the photographer. She would suggest the creative shots at times. You know that she’s done this GAZILLION times already.  She had been my muse. #millenials

Here she was awaiting for the rest of the group (in Tatay viewing deck) to come up for our briefing. She gives a good contrast to the foggy background, yeah? It was drizzling intermittently, sayang walang ulan sa picture. And that pose?! She did not know I was taking this

For some tips? Well:

1. Food – Eat up before going up!!! During the trail, bring your poison. Mine was Snickers.:) They’ve got trail mix and bananas and whatnot.
2. Water – I had a liter but I did not drink much.
3. Bladder break – no CR during the course but you can do your thing BEFORE it starts.
4. Difficulty – easy peasy! Ahaha! Only because the course was paved already, none of that slippery slopes even if it was drizzling.
5. Rain – great if you have a parka but the park ranger/guide also provides you with one
6. Wildlife encounter – there was not much really but there’s more probability if you do the trek at night
7. No cell service – a little outside Antipolo City, as you enter Baras-Tanay Rizal area, your mobile phone loses signal and it is true all the way to the Masungi. Make sure you do not lose your friends because it would be hard to get in touch with them
8. DO NOT LEAVE TRASH/TRACE – my shoes started unraveling, I put all the pieces that I tore off (before they fall off and gets lost) in my bag.