Reaching the peak needs patience

February 17, 2018 Ikit ng Bayan Opinion

Hiking is one way of taking your stress away aside from beautification, shopping and travelling. I and some of my friends from church went to Sitio Sta. Fe Brgy. Ampucao Itogon, Benguet last Feb. 12, Monday. Their registration fee from 13 to 17 year olds is P20 per head while 18 years old to 59 is P100 per head and free for Senior Citizens. When you are alone or a group of 2 to 7 individuals, the tour guide fee is P600 and for camping, P1K. If you have your own service, the parking fee costs P50 per vehicle.

Mt. Ulap has three peaks which will start at Tomtombek going to the 1st peak named Ambanao- Paoay, which is 1,780 meters above sea level. The 2nd peak is Gungal, in 1,914 meters above sea level and the 3rd peak which is the well-known as Mt. Ulap is 1,846 MASL. It was named as Mt. Ulap for the main reason of the clouds kissing the mountain or better known as the sea of clouds.

In my own experience iKit, for this is actually the 7th Mountain that I hiked in Baguio-Benguet and Mt. Province, I must say it looks a lot like Mt. Pulag, Mt. Kalugong and Mt. Cabuyao-Sto. Thomas. Combine them all together you can surely say this is Benguet. I have heard from a friend before that why would we spend thousands of money going to other places and even abroad when you can easily go and explore first the tourist spot on your own place? This is a challenge for me and so I started hiking in the age of 16 and hopefully before I reach the age of 33 I can still hike Mt. Ugo and Mt. Amoyao.

I do believe age doesn’t matter at all iKit for our tour guide Manong Roello, aged 56, who reminds us of the dos and don’ts, shows us that when a tourist left a garbage you are responsible to pick it up whenever you see one on the ground. They have portable CR and even native comfort room if we want to try the old school. He even pointed where Baguio, Tuba, San Roque Dam and Philex Mining are located. He also narrates a story of a past hiker in comparison to others. He said that some hikers would say “Ayaw ko na!” Manong Roello said he cannot do anything for they do not have a choice but to finish it anyway. It is like a clock iKit, ang pag-akyat-panaog ng dalawang kamay nito ay hudyat ng buhay mo. Pasasaan ba at mararating mo rin ang inaasam basta magkaroon ng mahaba pang pasensya sapagkat wala namang bagay na kapag minadali ay maganda ang kinalalabasan.

To my brethren in Christ (KJV) 1Thessalonians 5:25 “Brethren, pray for us.” Let’s pray for one another even to those who hate you to make this world in peace. This is yours truly, Tita Ara Katter.