The Beautiful Secret of Rizal – Mt. Daraitan, Tinipak Cave and River

My Friends and I have made a mark in one of the best place in Tanay, Rizal.  We were all excited and of course, looking forward to see all the best things that the place can offer so we pushed through with this trip.

Mt. Daraitan can be found in Brgy. Daraitan in Tanay, Rizal. Daraitan is a traditional community that offers wide options of nature tripping activities.  Daraitan means “kitaan” or “tagpuan” (a place to meet).  Tatay Pido says that long before, Mt. Daraitan is a place where “katutubo” used to gather.

How to go there?

You can get there by riding a jeep at Shaw Boulevard (crossing) going to Tanay Market.

Once you reach Tanay Market, you have 2 options, either you ride a jeep (cheaper) or a tricycle (expensive).  There were advantages and disadvantages by choosing any of the two.  When you reach Tanay Market, there were numerous tricycle driver that will approach you and ask you where you’re going.  Either they’ll say, “Daranak” or “Daraitan”.  I advise not for you to entertain those because the price they’ll give just to go to Daraitan can range to P1300.00 and cheapest is P700.

The only advantage I can see from riding a Tricycle is that you can go as early/late as you want.  On the other hand, by riding a monster jeepney, there are only 2 schedules of trip going to Daraitan —  Either at 10am or 1pm.  We just decided to walk around the market to buy some food to eat for our climb and wait for 1pm trip.  The jeep will go whether the jeep is full or not BUT the irritating part is that, people whose from Daraitan will usually reserve a seat and walk around the market even they know that it’s already 1pm. Tss. I really thanked God for giving us so much patience in these kind of situations.  We left at 1:45pm, 45 minutes late than the scheduled time.

The road is rocky and dusty and terribly loooonnngggg. The adventure did not start at the jump off but during our travel going to the jump off.

In this picture, we are passing a river that sunk almost half our jeepney. I thought the water will reach the window of the jeepney (I’m not exaggerating!) but thank God, it did not.

Hours of travel from the market to Daraitan is 2 hours, so we arrived at the Baranggay Hall at 3:45pm.  We quickly talked to Kuya Willie about our plan to go to the summit that afternoon and we’ll be needing a guide (getting a guide is actually compulsory.)  We were surprised to the rates of getting a guide. Below is the picture of their current rate. (As of February 2014)

Note: The rate posted is as of February 2014

Of course, we can’t agree to the rates above but what can we do? We haggled and agreed for a certain amount and proceeded with the climb.

We started preparing ourselves for the trek. They have assigned Tatay Pido to be our guide.

Hazy, Joey, and Lyka – ready to conquer Mt. Daraitan!

We started to trek at 4 in the afternoon.  The trail was rocky and muddy when we go up but it was fine. I also noticed the absence of stations where we can rest.

 

Water Source after an hour of trekking

There were also parts of the trail where you will encounter loose rocks.  There were a lot of sharp stones that they call as marbles or marmol. We were deceived with thorny trees as you will be needing to hold one for the steep trails and we were all full of scratches and rashes because of that.

There were a lot of portions of the trail that are really technical!  We were even telling Tatay Pido that this mountain was just classified as a minor mountain with trail class of easy, but it’s not! Anyways, Tatay Pido has been always quick and patient with all our cries that afternoon. hehe

Though we may be classified as major complainer, God has still given us a beautiful sunset. 🙂

Sunset at the trail of Mt. Daraitan

Almost Perfect Triangle na!

We were able to reach the summit at 7:00 in the evening so we saw the lights and the busy city of Manila from the top. Yipee! (Unfortunately, we weren’t able to take a picture of it because the summit is crowded as there is no more real space for us.) We were also surprised that the summit is too small for camping. We don’t even have a space to tent to or even to stand to! Good thing that Tatay Pido and other Tour guides helped in paving some part down a bit from the summit to stay into.

Tatay Pido paving the part where we will install our tent

It was a blessing in disguise that we were on the bit down side of the summit. At least the coldness of the air at the summit doesn’t reached our place so much as there were trees covering us as well.

We didn’t plan anything for the rain and that’s totally our fault. It was raining all night till the next morning.  Though, there’s no news that a storm will pass, there is a low pressure going on that day. So, the promising sea of clouds of Mt. Daraitan was not available at that time.

The only picture we have at the rainy and foggy summit 😦

We went down — wet and disappointed. Everything, as in everything were wet. 😦  Because of the heavy rain, the trail gets really slippery and became too hard for us to descend.  I can’t even count how many times we did rappelling.  The trail was too steep too! it took us almost 9 hours going down since we did traverse to Tinipak River.  We were all tired, wet, hungry, but still wanted to push on going to Tinipak Cave that day (I can’t imagine what type of spirit we have that day, to think of even sticking to the plan).  Tatay Pido suggested not for us to go anymore and just wait for the next day for other plans.  We were a bit sad by breaking our itinerary because of the unexpected bad weather.

In this picture, we were all wet. From head to toe. Swear.

As writing this, I was thinking why we were still smiling in these pictures? The descent was really hard and crazy!

As suggested by Tatay Pido, we stayed overnight at Baranggay Hall.  We were all thankful with the kindness of the people in there.  They also helped me dry my wet clothes for the next day and so, I am very grateful. Bless you!

The next day, we felt our sored muscles in our legs and shoulders crying for more rest but we were stubborn enough not to listen and continue to our main reason of staying another night at the place.

We took a hearty breakfast and prepared ourselves for Tinipak Cave, we leave the Baranggay Hall at 8am and reached the starting point for Tinipak Cave at 8:30am

Along the way, we took a few photos of the landscape of Tinipak River.  It was so beautiful!  Boulders of limestone were crafted around the famous Tinipak River.

Tinipak River has a lot to offer when we talk about beautiful rocks and super clean water.  You can even drink the water from the river! (I swear!)

This is the famous “For the boys” of Tinipak (as per Kuya Willie) – Do I have to explain more?

Take a closer look, you’ll see something that looks like a face.

We crossed the river through a short bridge, conquer the white rocks, and all – finally, we’re going to start checking the Tinipak Cave!

Pictures below are taken inside the Tinipak Cave

Lyka enjoying the water inside Tinipak Cave

Stallactites inside Tinipak Cave

This is really creepy, I know.

After enjoying the short adventure inside the cave, we soak ourselves to Tinipak River

All these made our tummies hungry. So we had a handful of Buko from someone whose selling from the area. Refreshing!

    We head back to the Baranggay to wrap everything we have and pack our stomach with their special lomi available around the area. We left Brgy. Daraitan at 6pm since we will be waiting for other participants from the other group to arrive.

I felt that I had the longest weekend and longest day of my life but it was all worth it. We were able to laugh in our worst times of this journey and I think that it is the most important thing to do – To laugh in our painful, crazy and yet happiest feeling of achievement afterwards.

Let me share to you some sayings we mouthed during our climb to Mt. Daraitan

“Hindi lahat ng nakaumbok ay bato, minsan tae pala.” – Hazy

“Controlling yourself from falling will make you stronger” – Lyka

“Minsan kailangan mo lang huminga para malaman mong kaya mo pa.” – Joey

“Ang maniwala sa sabi-sabi ay walang tiwala sa sarili.” – Tatay Pido

Breakdown of Expenses

Shaw Blvd (Crossing) to Tanay Market – P53.00

Tanay Market to Daraitan (Monster Jeepney) – P60.00

Registration – P20.00

Tourguide – P800 (Depends)

Add/follow me:

IG:  joeyinwanderland

FB: http://www.facebook.com/theadventourist1

Please leave a comment/follow/like this article, if you happen to read this. Thank you!