FOR SOULS AND SAINTS: THE KALATUNGAN-WIJI TRAVERSE EXPERIENCE #1

The proud Mt. Katalungan viewed from Mt. Wiji Summit

The time is ripe! We are resolved to push ourselves to our limit…if we have one. The Kalatungan-Wiji traverse is a dreaded 8/9 in the difficulty scale (Pinoy Mountaineer) and honestly, we are a bit worried about this. The dead nail’s trail poses a traumatic remembrance of the Mt. Ugo’s long and exhausting descent that literally killed some of our nails. Are we going to do this again? Maybe this time, we are going to cremate our dead nails.

The plan to conquer Kalatungan was rather an alternative to scaling Mt. Kitanglad which we avoided because of a previous climber’s disappointment. We don’t want to experience that so we chose another venue, another peak to overcome. Fortunately, this time, we are going to summit not only one but two peaks in one expedition.

The communications were made, the invitations were sent, the gears were updated and the date was set.  A long holiday was the choice for this arduous task. October 28-30 is weekend and 31 to November 1 is a non-working holiday. We have a 5-day break that would be enough for this undertaking.

Leaving Mactan International Airport on a delayed Cebu Pacific flight

Six able men and women committed to climb and we did not lose much time. We contacted a close friend in Cagayan De Oro for accommodation and transportation and we right away proposed our itinerary. One climber comes from Luzon, three from the Visayas and two from Mindanao. We are eventually “inter-archipelagic”, so to say.

An hour up in the air and now we just landed in Laguindingan Airport

Meet up at the airport

DAY 0

Destination Cagayan De Oro

Our meet up venue was at a travel agency in Cagayan de Oro. Scheduled to meet up in the afternoon, we played with lady luck to arrive on time knowing that with flights getting delayed, we are going to spoil our planned activities. The first to arrive in Cagayan de Oro is the one coming from Luzon. Yes! It is always the case. The one from the farthest is the first one to arrive. The next to arrive is the delegate from the Visayas who endured more than an hour of flight delay. The last delegation has the home court advantage.

Jing ang Gay at the Laguindingan Airport Arrival area after flight delays

At 8pm, as planned, we hastily purchased our provisions trying to catch up before the store closes because it was already too late. We don’t want to proceed without our food rations. We hurriedly went back to our meet up point, met and greeted each other, did some repacking and freshening up for the long trip ahead. We are scheduled to leave at 10pm to beat the sunrise at the jump off in Pangantucan, Bukidnon.

We already left past 10pm with the thought that we can beat our schedule if we drive a bit faster. But what the heck, our self-drive van has malfunctioning brakes. It was noticed when at the crossroad, the vehicle did not stop. Hahaha! Now this, we could not drive faster and we don’t have time to change vehicles. We just prayed that no incident will gravely happen before our climb.

Driving in Cagayan de Oro to Bukidnon late at night is smooth and fast apart from being quite dark because there are few street lamps. Though the roads are impressively wide, it’s just so dangerous to overspeed when you could not see well and you have malfunctioning brakes.

DAY 1

Early Arrival

With a lot of help from my co-pilot, I tried to stay awake because I have never really slept for two days straight and the jetlag is sickening. Then, here I am, driving for the next six-hour trip to our destination. The rest of the gang, are in the middle of their dreams. Feeling exhausted and starved, we tried to look for a place to eat. Arriving in Malaybalay past 2am, we stopped at a nearby 7-11, the only open shop. Well, it should. Satisfying temporarily our growling tummies, we proceeded further. Before reaching Valencia, we got stuck in traffic at this hour of dawn. We were just standing still for an hour or more. There was an infrastructural work on a bridge and both ways were barred. We were really worried of not making it on time.

Driving and driving in a never-ending road, we turned away from the highway and we traversed the provincial road that will bring us to Pangantucan. We even drove past Pangantucan. Going back on our track we finally reached the Municipal Hall of Pangantucan at 0430hrs. With the delays and the pit stop, we still managed to travel in six-hours. How is this possible? I have no idea.

Only the assigned guard was present at the Municipal hall. We begged to use the washrooms and we rested for several minutes just to acclimatize ourselves. The weather was fair and it was subtly cold. We were too early. The offices were still closed and will not be open until 7am. We asked around were we can take breakfast and the folks were kind enough to direct us to a small “carenderia”. Though it was open, breakfast was not yet served. So what we did was to park the van and dozed off.

A sunny day to start the trek

By 0630hrs, we woke everyone up for breakfast. The carenderia was soon catering not only to us but to early workers and patrons at the start of the new day. After breakfast, we purchased our lunch together with the lunch of our porters and guide. We freshened up a bit and warmed ourselves up for the climb. We were greeted with a very fair weather and sunny at that. We were not any more concerned about our timetable. 

G, Fra and Son filling up the waiver issued by the DOT in Pangantucan

By 0830hrs we reported to the Department of Tourism but this was already too late and the sun was really up and shining. We filled up the waiver, paid the registration and waited for our ride. There is another large group who will climb also today and they are organizing a reach-out program for the inhabitants of Mendis (jump off point). There was a van that will carry all their bags and equipment and we put our luggage also together with theirs. We took our habal-habal ride and in less than 30 minutes, we arrived at Mendis. We met our guide and porters and we dispersed our provisions and gear to them. The ritual that we were compelled to attend was already passed on to the large group so we were already free of that. 

Getting cozy with the Habal-habal. It's still a 30min drive to Mendis Jump off

At Brgy. Mendis Multi-purpose Hall, we distrubuted our loads to our porters. All are excited now to start the trek.

The pose before the trek. No one has any idea of the difficulties that lie ahead. Good luck guys!

As soon as everything was in order, we held our prayer and we started our trek. Everyone was reminded that this trek is not an ordinary endeavor because every step we make and every difficulty we encounter, we offer them to the souls of our loved ones. May our sacrifices will liberate our dearly departed from the pains they are undergoing wherever they may be.

The first hour of the trek is usually the hard one.

Lunch break

Past 1pm, we arrived at the View Deck and we prepared our lunch. The view deck is a two-storey wooden structure complete with tables and benches. There is a good view of the plains and hills below if you go up the deck. As we heard, some mountaineers made this place also as their campsite. The only problem was the presence of a bunch of honey bees and they scared our ladies very much. Don’t just hurt them and they will not sting. It was just a relief that they did not cause much trouble, though, at times they really ventured into the deepest recesses of our pants. 

Crossing by the river during the first hour of trekking. Someone's glove fell over the water to oblivion.

We have decided to camp at the summit of Kalatungan because I was convinced that the group can make it to the top before dark. But the guide told us that with our pacing, we might reach the summit at 7pm. I was then confident that we can make it. In less than an hour of lunch break, we proceeded towards the forest line where all kinds of vegetation were already visible.

By the time we reached Buko-buko sa Anay, it was already past 4pm and they said that we are still a long way up the summit. The ascent was gradual but the distance seemed a bit farther still. 

Gay and B at the Buko-buko sa Anay's Ridge

Heavy downpour

After passing by Saco camp, it started to pour. This was what I dreaded. The higher we climb, the wet we become and the colder it gets. As we were passing by the mossy forest, the rain went heavy and we have got to stop to pull our ponchos out. Then it started to get darker by the minute. We become oblivious of the trail markers that we have to get our head lamps. We took a bit of time to find it because it was buried deep in our backpacks. We thought that we are very near the Junction Campsite but it was all an illusion. As we got into the grassy field, the wind was battering upon us. Traversing between the grassy hills, I felt like it’s endless. Darkness fell upon us and I was already worried about those who were still farther down. Will they make it? Will they camp out somewhere down there? We started to fabricate theories on how we are going to survive if worst comes to worst. Our porters were also divided among the small groups. If we are going to decide to just camp out because we could not move on, do we have all the gear to keep us alive through the night. We thought that we can. Then the guide met us along the way. He wanted to carry our gear for us but I begged him to rather fetch the last group behind us. They said that they were still at Buko-buko sa Anay, which in my rough estimate would still be a couple of hours behind us. Our guide proposed that under this weather condition we could not anymore reach the summit. We need to camp out for the night at the Junction camp. He has instructed the group who were ahead of us. Even those who were ahead of us did not yet reach the campsite. Thus, we are still so far away. We’re dead! 

The mossy forest

Crisis management

Little by little, we pushed through. The group was divided among three smaller group of two’s. My torch was starting to give up on me. It was not fully charged. Oh my! I could not see where I am going anymore. We went deep into the jungle again somehow shielding us from the wind and downpour. Not seeing well where I am going, I fell several times even once I tumbled down when my pack got stuck in a branch. I picked myself up and with the last ounce of courage I inched my way to the campsite. We arrived at 7pm (just as the guide was telling us when we were still at the View Deck). I was overconfident that we can make it to the top. I found our fellow mountaineers using the cabin as their tent because they were drenched and were shivering in the cold. Our guide decided to go back and help the last group. Since there were still porters along with the last group, we could not organize as of yet. Our gears and provisions were divided so much so that we could not cook because the butane canisters were at the last porter. Even our tents were scattered. This was for us another experience that we could not forget. We were drenched and chilling under the cold temperature. We rummaged through our packs looking for something to make hot drinks. Even the food was with the last porter. All we could do was to establish right away a dry place so that we can jump into our dry clothes and be warm. 

The saving camp

Good thing that the tarp is already at the camp. We assembled it right away and built it above a wet patch of clearing. We put the ground sheet and we hurriedly switched into our dry outfits. After that, we erected another tent for our suffering members. We were lucky to find one butane canister from the backpack of our guide and we started heating up hot noodles to keep us warm. Everything was topsy-turvy. Our gears and equipment were scattered around. There was mud all around. I could not organize everything. Maybe this is the effect of hypothermia – disorientation. In one hand, we are struggling to survive. In the other hand, it was ridiculous. We could not seem to complete the tasks in hand because our supplies were scattered among the porters. Much of what we need were with the last porter. Adrenaline kicked in and we improvised for survival’s sake. The last group arrived at 9pm, two hours behind us.

Exhaustion

All were wasted. Some did not anymore take dinner and just slept their way out of the cold. Our guide and porter prepared the meal on their own. Some of us just contented ourselves with the hot noodles and a cup of coffee. We did not even dare anymore to erect the rest of the tents because of exhaustion and just simply nowhere you can find a place good enough to build it. Under the tarp, three of us cramped in a very small place using all the heat we can to make it through the night.

The longest night

This was one of the longest nights in my life when however you want to sleep was not just possible because of the frigid night. We were at the mercy of the 5-10degrees temperature with no walls or windbreaker to protect us. I was really freezing out in the night and it was still before midnight. Oh my! What have I done to deserve this??? My companions were sound asleep (I presumed) while I was fighting with numbness. I prayed that it will be daylight right away. Rain kept on pouring and the night seemed to pass us by so slowly. I never considered anymore the danger of night creatures crawling on us or whatever. I was focused on how to heat myself up so I can sleep. But to no avail, I was just counting sheep ever hour, every minute and every second of the night.

…to be continued.