Samal’s Island Traverse Trekking to offer Extraordinary Adventure Experience

Written and based on actual experience by Julius R. Paner, MFSM External Vice President

When the Tourism Office of Island Garden City of Samal convinced the Mountaineering Federation of Southern Mindanao (MFSM) to facilitate a Traverse Trekking from Barangay San Antonio of Babak down to Barangay Aundanao, every mountaineer thought it would just be an effortless climb. Others considered a Putting-Bato experience as a basis for such an easy voyage and it could even offer just a common mountaineering activity. Well, it would be easier said than done. The real test will come March 3-4, 2010.

When I joined the reconnaissance survey last February 21-22, 2010 along with Gabo and Bryan, we discovered something unique about the trail. The ocular inspection turned out to be a trailblazing activity. We got lost twice, had to maintain a very efficient water management and had to go through several subsistence before we considered the trekking over.

Our first stop was at the house of a mountain guide in San Antonio. From there it took us 3 and a half hours before reaching the campsite in a cultivated farm land saturated with agro-forestry crops. Although the water source from the campsite is very far (just to warn would-be participants that the last station to refill water is at the house of a mountain guide in San Antonio), what’s good about the campsite is that everything about Davao City is visible especially in the evening.

The next day, we thought once again that the trail going down would be just as simple as eating peanuts. Alas, it never looked that easy either. As Bryan would put it, it could be a “White Peak Material”. We had to pass through bushes of bamboo species with a trail that was as small as our slippers. So small that we must take extra care not to stumble or else we would be rescued down under as deep as the Pacific Ocean. We were walking on top of a ridge, all ridges…and when we thought we were on the right track going to Aundanao being the trail tail, we instead passed the other dead creek with destination unknown to all of us. Thinking that streams flow directly to the ocean, we followed its minute flow and eventually landed in a different destination. We landed instead to Sitio Kima.

Several mountain ranges can be viewed while we were traversing one ridge after the other. The highest point we recorded was at 500 masl and the rest offers medium-range mountain crests. There will be portions of the trail where a rope should be installed for easy climbing access. Once again, there is no water source in the area, that’s why I would like to mitigate everybody of efficient water management and to bring enough water for personal consumption (although we asked the village folks to bring potable water for sale during that date). The trail was previously elapsed by human beings (particularly by local folks) on August 2009. We were in fact the first mountaineers who stepped into that part of the world and it was the first ever in the history of Philippine Mountaineering (heheh). Along the way, we saw several wild orchids carpeting a huge part of the trail, proof only of the area’s flora diversity.

In a nutshell, this upcoming climb promises to be a mammoth experience for us. Another good point about the trekking is that it will be finished off in an incredible island of Canibad. It might just be a minor climb but the experience will somehow be “blue-chip”. #