Sunrise trekking in Mt. Gulugod Baboy

It has only been two weeks and I'm back to the mountains. It could have been only a week interval if only I was able to wake up early last week for the Mt. Batulao hike. This is already getting on my system and I'm happily loving it! :) I hoped for more travels for 2015 and I guess, this is one of the answer to my prayers, meeting people who shares the same passion for travel and adventure and getting to discover a new hobby at the same time!

Yesterday, I was able to witness sunrise from the top of Mt. Gulugod Baboy with my CS friends. And it was crazy beautiful and surreal! We started the trail at 4:30 am and reached the summit before 6am which was just in time as after some minutes, the sun is already peeking out. The wind is so strong at the top and the clouds (or fog?) were moving towards us! It was like in the movies, you know the scene before the superhero flies through the sky with the clouds passing by. haha! It was just the perfect timing, like a very nice intro for the majestic scene that we are about to witness! God's creation is truly breathtaking.

Mt. Gulugod Baboy is located at Anilao, Batangas which is well known for its diving spots. That is why, going to the beach or island hopping to Sumbrero island and other nearby islands are usually done as a side trip after hiking Mt. GB. Though not the case for us, as we did a trip to Taal, the old Vigan of Batangas, which I would talk about more on my next post. :)

We started our climb at 4:30 am and no one's up from the jump-off point for us to register or ask for directions. Armed with flashlight and headlamps, we decided to start our way up. It was a steep pavement up at first that is why we quickly got tired and already catching our breath on the first 20 mins of our climb. Haha! It was still very dark at that time but good thing there are lights coming from the houses we pass by to ask for proper direction. After some more minutes, the trail finally got real as we start to go through the rocky trail with grasses and trees around you. The thing with Mt. Gulugod Baboy is it's a mountain which has also been a dwelling place for some families, that is why from time to time you will see a house around the corner with a hut open for hikers to rest at. Once you reach the top, you would be walking past through cows that the people from there owns. 

Once you reach the open area summit which looks like a set out of the movie "Sound of Music", the trek starts to get easier as we go run up to the top in anticipation of the sun that is already peeking from the clouds.

Minutes after, the sun is already starting to rise from the sea of clouds. That moment was beyond perfect! The clouds were blown toward our direction as we gaze on the majestic sunrise. It was like we're on the movies, like the opening remarks on a superhero flick where the superhero is about to appear flying across the screen. I tried taking a video, but it just didn't gave justice to the moment. It left us in awe, that moment was just perfect!

After consuming the view, we started to prepare our "breakfast" to complete the experience. haha! We brought some paper plates but decided to eat through the paper cups because... I really don't know. lol. Being in the mountains, makes you a no-fuss person that you just want to keep everything plain and simple. Oh, and maybe because of the strong winds that it would be hard to use a paper plate. haha!

This dog just kept posing in front of us but in reality, he's just after our food. haha!

After spending an hour at the top, we started our descent which only took us an hour excluding the 45min. rest we had in the kubo.

Now, I want to do sunrise trekking in each mountain!

Registration Fee: Php 40

Update: We hiked up again Mt. GB last April 4 (Holy Week).  We got to the summit at around 7:30am and there's a lot of people up there. Tents are also almost everywhere near summit so if you would want to experience the best out of GB on a dayhike, better go on a regular day and be up there as early as 6am to see the sun coming out :)