Taal Volcano : Up close

It was saturday morning, the sun is up and were wondering what place to conquer this time. We just drive and drive, dont care where the road will lead us until a bright idea came up from nowhere.. "Punta tayo Crater ng Taal!". That was indeed a spontaneous one. We really had no idea of going there until that very moment. And since both of us havent gone to the place yet, we decided to go and headed to south. But the funny thing is, both of us have no idea on how to get there. We thought at first that we just have to go to the people's park and from there, there will be a boat waiting to bring us to the volcano crater.

But as we approach Picnic Grove, we saw some bystanders holding some signboards with taal Crater written on it. So we decided to ask these folks for some informations. We found out that we still need to drive around 15-20 more minutes from the park and go to the resort where the boats are stationed. "Magkano ang boat ride?" I asked them and the man told me it's P1500. I told them, "Wala na bang bawas? Dalawa lang naman kami na pasahero, hindi masyado mabibigatan ang banka nyo.." But according to them, the price of the boat ride is fixed, no matter how many passengers are taking the ride. So we thought that's its better to go there in group, but since were already there, we made some few negotiations and finally settled for P1200 pesos. And after we close the deal, the guy boarded our vehicle to accompany us to their port area. I thought we were given a high price, but as we saw other competitors rate, its a bit higher compared to ours plus the fact that those others with higher price were not registered/licensed resorts to operate the business. So I told myself, "not bad.."

As we stand in the shore getting ready for the boat ride, we can clearly see the Volcano Island and it really commands a forceful presence and that what makes us more excited to reach the island in the middle of the lake. As we reached the island shore, we need to do some more haggling for the horse ride. On the way to the island, the boatmen gave us a hint that the folks in the island they would normally charge P500 for the horse ride to the crater but we have to do the negotiations ourselves. But since they thought that were from a wealthy society because of our appearances (ahem!), we couldnt do better than P600/person. Walking is an option, but you need to endure the heat as well as the dust every time the wind blows, not mentioning that the way to the top is indeed a steep one. It is a 20-minute journey to the top, and after that horse-ride, man!! sakit ng pwet ko.. hehehehe..

Finally we reached the top and the view from there was really awesome! Its a refreshing sight for both the mind and body. Good thing there are huts where you can rest your tired body so we sat there, take a rest and relax for a while enjoying the view. There are some vendors selling refreshments like softdrinks and buko juice, and badtrip!!, there is a vendor there offering us buko juice but since we havent taken our lunch yet, we refused to buy some. We continued to enjoy the scenery and by just merely looking at the crater and the view makes our thoughts fly until the vendor (who is selling buko juice to us) approached us telling us to go somewhere else since there are I think Korean people coming. "Lipat na lang kayo ng pwesto, d naman kayo bibili eh.. Ung mga Koreano bibili yan." mentioned the vendor. This really made my blood rise and I replied, "Bakit kelangan ba bumili para makaupo dito?!" I really dont want to leave the place where we were sitting just to annoy the vendor but the vendor would not stop talking and whispering to co-vendors. So just not to spoil the day and our taal get away, we left our resting haven and start exploring the place, taking some pictures and stuffs. The sights were indeed breath-taking. We saw some tiny holes in the ground releasing some sulphuric gas (I guess) which lead us to the idea that this one is still an active one. The place was clean and was properly maintained by the Tanods there.

Around 2:30 pm, we decided to go back down to the shore while the sky are still a bit cloudy and also were already starving. On the way down, the horse guides who were with us are cousins (if I remembered correctly). And on the way down, we were really in a hurry. I would tell the boy, "hey dont be on a rush", because it was really painful in the butt (hehehe) because the road is not smooth. He would slow down for a while, and afterwards start to gain speed once again, overtaking other horses that came our way. I later found out that this boy was trying to run after his crush which was couple of meters ahead of us. Because of that, I didnt gave him that much of a tip.

As we reach the port area, we took pleasure eating baked macaroni as our lunch, which is just one of HER many specialties, and one of the best I ever tasted. =) And at the end of the day, all we have are tired bodies but it's all worth it!


Here is the AVP of our Taal Journey, which is included in our first AVP, Episode 1.