Lake Holon and Mt. Melibingoy (Mt. Parker) in South Cotabato, Philippines

“Remind me again why we’re doing this” were the only words that I managed to let out in between gasps as I turned around to face my fellow travel bloggers. They were battling their own breathlessness.

“We have no idea,” they answered with synchronized laughter while trying to scale another sharp slope.

With all that I had been through during the trek, a pointer would help me reclaim the focus that has slipped somewhere along the trail, possibly during the moments I lost balance, slid down, and scratched all my limbs. There was a teensy part of me that wanted to back out. The part, however, was not only cowardly  but also dumb for I had come a long way.

A long, long way.

We had spent practically four hours trekking under the fickle skies — in some cases threatening us with the looming rainclouds, other times frying us with the harshest sunlight. Not counting the full hour we were carried by a habal-habal on the bumpiest — no, bounciest — ride I had ever had a pleasure of surviving. The magnitude 8 trembling of my knees and the intensity 10 profanities I involuntarily cried would have been for nothing if I turned back. The only chicken this day was going to see was the one I had for breakfast that morning.

Tired but completely awed
Little wounds and scratches
Blogger sandwich! Fellow bloggers on a habal-habal ride before the trek
But I still needed a reminder. even just a peek of our destination? alsjeblieft?

It wasn’t like we had not been pampered by the mountain the past hours. It had, actually. Along the way, we found some of the tallest trees, the smallest nepenthes (pitcher plants), and the sexiest clouds that I laid eyes on. After all, we were there for a reason.

Wat wordt er in deze gids behandeld?

Lake Holon and the Allah Valley
A path rarely Trodden
The Reclusive Calm of Lake Holon

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Lake Holon and the Allah Valley

Located in T’boli, South Cotabato, Mt. Melibingoy towers over the town with its highest top at 1,750 meters. A dormant stratovolcano, it harbors a crater named Lake Holon, which was formed after an eruption on January 4, 1641. The mountain and the lake are also known as Mt. Parker and Lake Maughan, in honor of American surveyors whose plane crashed at the site. It has also nurtured wild, endemic flora and fauna.

Lake Holon feeds Allah River that flows across South Cotabato all the way to Maguindanao. It is a main source of food and livelihood in the Allay Valley, an area shared by South Cotabato and Sultan Kudarat.

Allah River meandering in between cliffs
Allah Valley has been battling floods because the 1990s. To create a solution, a group called Allah Valley Landscape development alliance (AVLDA) was formed. They discovered that one of the problems was the environmental degradation in the highlands because numerous locals are forced to cut down and burn trees to earn a living. funded by LGSP-LED, a collaborative program between the Philippines and Canada, they are formulating an eco-tourism program as a much more sustainable alternative source of income for the people. AVLDA and LGSP-LED invited bloggers, myself included, to try their proposed tourism circuits to help them better the program with our feedback and spread the word about South Cotabato and Sultan Kudarat.

A path rarely Trodden

It wasn’t my first time to trek, but it was my first trek to a not-so-popular destination. It shows on the trail itself. Thick moss blanketed numerous parts of the trail, which was also fringed with overgrown turf and flowering shrubs.

It was both frightening and encouraging. Frightening, because we knew we were going the narrow, slippery way. (Later, I would find myself unintentionally stepping on a moss-covered rock and sliding three meters down, injuring my arms.) Encouraging, because the tougher the trail got, the much more we realized we were in for a treat — the pristine, practically untouched kind. and we were right.

Lois of We Are Sole Sisters
Mossy ground, sunny skies
Pretty little things that caught my eye
A man building a home and a small community along the trail to Lake Holon
The Reclusive Calm of Lake Holon

A wound and 34 scratches later (yes, I counted), I finally reached the edge of the lake. As if all the fatigue vanished magically and with renewed energy, I ran to the banks and danced with the wind. The music: that distinctly amplified songs of the cicadas. The audience: the ghostly clouds kissing the peaks of Melibingoy and the tall turf that swayed lightly, which were reflected perfectly on the mirror-like surface of the lake. It was so clear and serene that a fly dipping a toe would send ripples across it and I would see it from where I stood.  No wonder, it has been awarded the Cleanest Inland Body of Water in the Philippines for two years.

Three conventional canoes were docked in one corner, as if waiting for us all this time. BeklimmenIng Mt. Melibingoy maakte ademhaling moeilijk, maar Lake Holon was helemaal adembenemend en rende ermee.

Kano hiermee omgaan? Spiegelt de lucht
Lois neemt haar aan de beurt naar kano, omdat ze dat kan. kano.
Gay of Pinay Travel Junkie en Edgar van Eazy Traveler
Moe, wie? Niemand van ons nam de moeite om te rusten. We waren maar papieren clips genadeloos getrokken naar de enorme vloeibare magneet voor ons. We braken weg en pauzeerden af ​​en toe om stil te bewonderen, alsof we aanbidden.

Toen het donker eindelijk het slinkende licht versloeg, was het diner klaar. De koude, koude wind bevorderde een sfeer die optimaal is voor reflectie. Maar met iemand die om de twee minuten een glas rum serveerde, was de enige reflectie die gebeurde de lichten van mijn telefoon die van mijn olieachtige gezicht stuiterde.

Ongestoord water
Koude, heldere ochtend bij Lake Holon. Foto door Gael Hilotin van Pinay Solo Backpacker
De volgende ochtend was ik een van de eersten die opstond. Net als Reflex, marcheerde naar de rand van het meer en koesterde zich in de zachte zon. Ik zat op een rotsblok en dacht aan de zware klim de dag ervoor en vreesde de wandeling terug naar beneden. Waarom houden we van wandelen en bergen klimmen, zelfs bij onverschillig weer? Twee locals – kanoën, vissen vangen – voorbijgingen, het oppervlak van het meer kabbelen dat met elke golf gracieus glinsterde. Er is geen betere aanwijzer dan Lake Holon.

Hoe kom je naar Lake Holon: vanaf de stad eigen van T’boli, rijd een habal-habal naar Salacafe. De reistijd is ongeveer 1 uur. Van Salacafe is het een trektocht van 3-4 uur over robuust terrein naar Lake Holon.

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