In my previous travel post, I shared with you the last leg of my Baler Travel series. Today we will continue with my Central Luzon backpacking Travel Series and we will explore another province, Nueva Ecija.
Nueva Ecija is a landlock Province surrounded by Aurora and Pangasinan and Nueva Vizcaya in the North, Pampanga and Tarlac in the West, Bulacan in the South and a part of Aurora in the East. There are a lot of attractions in Nueva Ecija but after plotting my schedule, I only had one day left. After thinking through and weighing the options, I decided I'd spend my precious day at Minalungao National Park.
It occurred to me that I won't make it to Gapan City, the capital of Nueva Ecija, before evening. To be safe, I booked a room via Airbnb in Cabanatuan City.
I arrived in Cabanatuan Terminal almost five in the afternoon. It was actually my first time renting a room via Airbnb. At first, it's scary because, unlike hotels, there are no security guards keeping the perimeter safe 24/7. But the building looked secure and the rooms were spacious and clean. And I'm only staying for less than 24 hours.
I wanted to explore Cabanatuan so I rode a tricycle and asked the driver to drop me off at SM City Cabanatuan. It was huge and it had an amazing overlooking view at the back portion of the mall. Later that day, I grabbed a mango-graham ice cream and watched a movie alone. My kind of day! I went home late at night. It was so scary to be in a dark unfamiliar street. Just happy that the tricycle driver was kind and accommodating. 😁
The following morning, I hopped in another bus bound to Gapan City.
Obviously I burnt my face in Baler!
Arrival at Gapan City
In a little over one hour, I arrived in Gapan City, Neuva Ecija. It was a beautiful day with clear skies and sunny atmosphere. I prebooked a tour and met my guide/driver who will accompany me for the rest of the day. He insisted to take a photo of me with the Gapan City landmark as background.
From Gapan City, we traveled for an hour via motorcycle. It might only be an hour but it surely was long but I enjoyed the view of endless rice fields until we reached forested pathways and bumpy road. Not long after that, we reached Minalungao!
Minalungao National Park is just one of the many protected National Parks scattered around the country. This was my 3rd National Park in this solo backpacking alone. I'll tell you more about the park in a separate post.
We paid the entrance fees and waisted no time since this is only a day tour. All along I thought I would only be seeing the river and the huge rock formation on both sides of the river as well as the floating cottages for which this place was known. Until the tour guide showed the way to one of the mountain top.
Before we reached the other side of the park, we need to walk through this hanging bridge that gave us the best 360-degree view of the place. I got lucky from start to end of this solo backpacking as I was always surrounded by people and accompanied by tour guides who were undeniably skilled in taking photos.
Here are a few snaps from the hanging bridge:
My tour guide said he'd do this photography trick and kept saying "Dyan ka lang, Ma'am. Huwag kang gagalaw" (Don't move, I got this! 🤣). So I gave my best pose and tada! My tour guide's hilarious tricks made me laugh, but I kept it to myself. It's artsy but not something I love to look at all the time. 😂
A pilgrimage site on a mountain top
So this was what I meant earlier. I didn't know there's a pilgrimage site at Minalungao. The site is located at one of the mountaintops and we need to trek in order to reach it. Minalungao might be forested but the path we took was barely covered with any trees.
If you're something who's not into trekking, you don't have to worry for the route to the top is already cemented. It's not hard at all; in our case, we just need to combat the scorching heat of the sun. Summer was definitely with us the entire time we stayed.
My guide would randomly ask for my phone as he found another great location for pictorials! And who am I to say no, right? 😂
Then right before we reached the huge cross which the guide had been blabbering about since we stepped into Minalungao, these bougainvilleas welcomed us. Don't ask me what happened here, my guide just did his job I guess. He was over the top! I felt that his only goal was to make his guest (that's me) happy! 😁
A few more steps and I finally laid eyes on the center of the pilgrimage site, where a huge cross is erected.
There were less than ten (10) people at the site when we arrived. We rested first, caught our breaths, while we marveled at the sight in front of us. The rest of General Tinio, I supposed, could be seen from where we were seated. Surprisingly the wind was so calming despite the hot day. The site was covered in tranquility when some of the pilgrims started to depart back to the other main attractions in the park. There was total silence; I could hear the flowing rivers nearby, the humming of the birds, and the swaying of the leaves.
My guide mentioned that being a pilgrimage site, this place is usually visited during the Lenten season which normally falls in late March or early to mid-April each year.
I took a few more photos of the place before we headed back to eat our lunch and explore the rest of Minalungao.
That's it for today's #Project81PH featuring Nueva Ecija!
See you on the next post! 😁
Living life intentionally every single day, she believes that there’s no limit to one’s potentials. Right now, she’s on the loose for the pursuit of endless holistic self-growth and development. She wants to light the way for others. She believes there’s no better way to leave a legacy than to pay it forward.
Her ultimate goal in life is to reach the state of enlightenment where there’s nothing but peace, love, happiness, and contentment - nothing more, nothing less.
If you are captivated by what this girl just wrote here, an upvote is pretty appreciated. Follow her as she tells her stories full of positivities. The next story might be for you! ❤️