Osmeña Peak Dalaguete

A less popular view from O Peak. I over-exposed most of my shots of the "real" peak.

A trip to the clouds is P50 pesos away from the town entrance of Dalaguete. You can take a motorcycle there for a 13-kilometer ascent through smooth and electric-bumpy road.

The froggy foggy road to Mantalongon, Dalaguete. Taken while riding a habal-habal.


Thick fog covering the narrow road that leads to Mantalongon seemed like a natural sight. I have mountain-biked up there three times and the fogs are ever-so-present.

You can ask the habal-habal driver to take you all the way to the foot of Osmeña Peak if walking is not your thing. But if you plan to walk from the marketplace of Mantalongon, just remember to turn left before the first bridge that you will cross. You will immediately see a groto of the Virgin Mary and that road will surely lead you there.

The barangay park at Mantalongon, around 12noon.

A Walk to not-Remember

Chyrel Gomez carrying our spare tent.

On the way to the summit, we were met by a kid who asked if we wanted water. We refused him politely then he went ahead of us to show the way. It seemed at first that he was just going home and leading us while he was at it. But then, our Good Samaritan turned out to be a paid tour guide. He met up with two more kids along the way. I don't know what they were up to but there were a lot of whisperings involved. I didn't want to be outdone so I also talked in whispers to everyone.

Osmena Peak way before you get there.

The tour boys told us that at the camp site we would pay 20 pesos each. When we neared the place, two teenage boys caught up with us. We made them walk ahead because their pace seemed faster than our SM-Ayala-Emall trained legs.

A footpath on the way to the camping site.

At the entrance of the camp area, we found them with handbook in hand, ready to collect our money. It was a surprise that was not welcome at all. I did not know that going to Osmena Peak involved a lot of fine print.

A wild boar.


Suddenly, an elder man joined and got the money from the two boys (I don't know where he sprung up. From the cracks in the ground, maybe!). He started whispering with them and the three kids who guided us. So it was a whispering party. Their equivalent to our metal music? That was the lousiest part of the trip. Any part where locals are conspiring is so not good. Anyway, we did not figured out what the 20 was for. There sure was no guard in the night or free firewood at least.

Campers resting. Osmena Peak is on the other side. I don't know what I was doing up here.

The road that we walked.

I did not bother complain about it. I have this one simple rule: if you are in a place where you are being robbed of 20 pesos in broad daylight in a quasi-legal way, just give them your money. You do not want to mess up with people who are on their own turf.

The wild boar-cat followed the campers.

A Shivery Night (the really scary movie sense)

Do I look like I don't know what I'm doing? Yeah I don't! I'm a mountain biker. This is only my second camp ever.

We bought canned tuna for the night because we thought that Osmena Peak was an ever-verdant place where lighting a bonfire is graver than blasphemy. We failed to consider the "established camp site" part. Soon as I found out that there is nothing to preserve about the place, I gather firewood for the night.

Our camp from afar. We were the only exception.

We went inside the tent at 7pm. We brought two tents, actually. I told a friend that I have a tent, COURTESY OF ROX, that can fit in five people. There were four of us on the trip and one failed to do the math so she brought another tent.

Chyrel Gomez with a bottle of The Bar.

Sahree, I digress like foot trails. Anyway, we went in at 7pm because our Agent friends haven't slept since their night shift. My eyelids were also heavy from exhaustion and boredom so I went inside my sleeping bag as well.

James with the ultimate camping gear: pink-and-yellow elephant pajamas.


But I was kept awake at night by the sound of tuna cans clattering outside (it's getting creepy typing this). There was no wind and definitely those were not fireflies eating from the can.

The five-minute bonfire. There was not enough wood to get by.

The undefinable noise and motion outside heightened my senses like I just chugged a gallon of espresso. Those were not humans outside, whatever they were, they just roamed freely around our tent after they were done with the cans. The fog has passed and the moon was bright enough to cast shadows against the tent. There was no shadow at all of that thing outside.

Our littered camp. We cleaned up before we left, promise!

I could not have cared of they were ghost or other entities (like those humanoids with three fingers who always want to phone home). Humans are the most dangerous creature of all. It is a wonder there is no world record to officially recognize that yet. Nothing could be worse than being robbed or killed for pure psycho murder while you are romanticizing the thought of sleeping in a tent at night instead of staying at the safety of your home.

View from Osmena Peak in the morning. There are so many peaks I don't know which really belongs to Osmena.

Whatever it was/they were, we just let them do what they pleased as they were not harming us (just scaring us to death). It made me wish that I've set up the other tent to give the illusion of number.

That must have happened between 8pm and 9pm. I woke up at 2am and went outside to do my part for the environment. Our three tuna cans were gone and we did not find them with the periphery of the campsite in the morning. There was no time for ghost stories. We had to set out for our Kawasan traverse, a.k.a. the long guess-walk through wilderness. Just to spoil the plot, we did find our way.

The whole place was dewy in the morning.