Pagudpud, Vigan and other related adventures

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As mentioned in my last post, me and my family, my girlfriend, my sister's boyfriend, and my grandmom all went to Pagudpud for the long holiday. Pagudpud can be found at the northernmost tip of the Philippines' biggest island, Luzon. Click here for some more info about Pagudpud.

Northbound to Vigan

We left Manila very early on the 26th (around 3am was it? I hardly remember because I was really out of it that night!) and took almost the whole day to get there (including stopovers!)

We stopped by for lunch at Vigan, the capital city of Ilocos Sur, famous for "its cobblestone streets, and a unique architecture that fuses Philippine building design, and construction with colonial European architecture." (Wiki)

Lunch was at Cafe Leona, where the food was quite good, actually. True blue Filipino cuisine. Cafe Leona was named after world renowned poet, writer and playwright Leona Florentino who hails from Ilocos Sur.

The Bangui Windfarm

Another one of the pitstops we took was for to take quick photos of the windfarm in Bangui, Ilocos Norte. The sun was setting fast and we wouldn't be able to take photos if we waited. Luckily we found a great place and got these cool photos.

The view was really awesome! (And yeah! Clean energy!) In the photo are 2 Mechanical Engineers (one is the other's son).

Pagudpud Beach

We finally got to the beach after about an hour or so more (and after getting lost!). We had dinner at the resort we were staying at (the food wasn't that great) and went straight to the dark evening beach to get a preview.

The sand was white and clean, and the waves strong. My younger sister couldn't wait to get a feel of the water so she stood on the beach and watched the waves break and the water go past her feet. When you stare as the water rushed back to the sea, you always get this feeling that you're getting pulled in. It's scary and exhilirating at the same time.

Despite the long drive and the gloomy weather the previous night, we were all greeted by sun! sun! sun! the next day. The beach was white and clean, not crowded at all. We spent the whole morning relaxing on the beach, my dad even got a hammock and stared out into the sea.



After lunch, we went looking for a place to get a massage, but couldn't find one. They said you'd have to call somebody from town to give a massage, and it would cost like 500 pesos. Expensive! So we just decided we'd just bury me in the sand and duel with the Pagudpud waves.

Pagudpud War of the Waves

We waged war against the waves, but lost, so we retired and just enjoyed the sunset. We retired early (also because there was nothing much to do at night there) and got up early the next day to say byebye to the beach go to Cagayan.

On the way to Cagayan, we stopped several more times, first to see another beach surfing site, then at a waterfalls beside the highway (to clean the windshield too!), then at the site of a Hydroelectric power plant that my dad helped build when he was still working with AG&P, and finally at Solomon's Hotel, a new hotel near Magapit Bridge that is owned by Tatay's former colleague.

We visited relatives in Lal-lo, Cagayan and stayed overnight before the looong drive back to Manila.

Click here to see more photos from our Pagudpud adventure...