I’ve hardly ever been north of Manila in the Philippines, so when a friend of mine asked whether or not I want to go to the Ilocos region in northern Philippines, I readily agreed. The Ilocos region is famous for their centuries old churches built more than three hundred years ago. A lot of these structures have stood the test of time as we will see soon.
There are a lot of ways to go to the Ilocos region from Manila as there are a lot of bus companies plying the route. We chose the bus company Partas. Their terminal is along Epifanio de los Santos Avenue, better known as EDSA. My friend who lives near the bus terminal bought us the tickets and we were there for the evening trip.
As I mentioned previously, I really dislike night trips, although I like them since there is no time wasted during the day, I could sleep the trip away and wake up when we get there. That is a big IF, since I hardly ever get any sleep whenever I go on overnight journeys. This one won’t be any different. Time to get to Vigan from Manila is 11 hours.
When we got on the bus, I was impressed how clean and spacious the bus was. Although, there are not as spacious and as fancy as the ones that ply the Singapore – Kuala Lumpur route, they are still pretty good. Soon we were off to Vigan. I tried to sleep and as expected, I couldn’t. Not even reclining the chair helped so I just stared outside to amuse myself.
Our first stop was somewhere in Bulacan. These are pretty common rest stop made especially for travellers to the provinces. There was ample space for parking a lot of buses and of course there was a small cafeteria to satisfy hungry travellers. I bought some chips and went back up the bus, hoping to catch a few winks.
While passing through one of the towns of Tarlac province, we were rocked by the sound of things hitting the bus. It turned out that some mischievous kids threw rocks at the windows of the moving bus. Fortunately, the rocks did not penetrate the bus but it left the windows of the bus cracked from the impact. It turned out that there was some shrapnel that made it to the passenger side, but no one was hurt. Knowing it was futile to run after the kids who did this, our bus continued along it way. It did stop by a police station to file a police report about the incident. It seems that the driver already knows what to do in these kinds of situations.
Looking back on this incident, it was certainly a very dangerous prank played by those kids. This brings the importance of having a proper highway system. Highways should not be built around towns but smaller roads from the highway should just feed into the towns. This will certainly improve the efficiency of the transport system here. This is already happening with the North Luzon Expressway or NLEX which in theory can extend all the way up to the Ilocos region. This will definitely cut down on travel time to and from Manila.
Our bus finally arrived at Vigan and I didn’t sleep a wink. I felt like a zombie from lack of sleep but my friends were already excited and raring to go sight seeing. We quickly hailed a tricycle to bring us to the place where we would be staying for the night – Daenee’s Place Lodging House. There wasn’t anything special about the lodging house but it was quite convenient since it was on the main road and not too far from the sights.
After getting our stuff ready, we hailed another tricycle to bring us to our first stop – Bantay Church. Bantay Church, officially known Shrine of our Lady of Charity Saint Augustine Parish Church, is in the town of Bantay in Ilocos Sur. Bantay Church is on a small elevation and visitors would immediately notice the stunning bell tower right in from of the gate. The bell tower was built on the highest part of the elevation and is impressive brick red structure. Yes, it is possible to walk up to the bell tower but the tower itself is off limits to visitors.
Bantay Church is one on the oldest churches in Ilocos Sur, it was built in the year 1590, that is more than four hundred years ago! Although the church was damage in the days of World War II, the church is now beautifully restored. And the Philippines being a Catholic nation, Bantay Church certainly has a huge number of parishioners visiting it to this day.
This was an impressive start for my visit to the Ilocos Region, now I am looking forward to the other places we can see here.
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