For once Chris and I had a comfortable minivan journey down the mountains, and back up, to a town called Banaue. As you enter the region, you soon realise why it is a popular tourist spot. All you can see is endless rice terraces down the valley. Unfortunately we had arrived a little too early in the year, and not all the rice had been planted. This meant the terraces were mainly brown, and not the lush green colour we were hoping for. Again, we had to register a...

'Bontoc' is normally just a transit point for most backpackers, but we'd done some research and found out about some hidden rice terraces, in nearby 'Maligcong'. Amelia and I arrived in Bontoc after taking another risky rooftop ride, on a Jeepney from Sagada. I can understand why people don't want to hang around in Bontoc, it is a very ugly city. Most of the buildings around are just bare grey concrete, or breeze block structures. And most...

Having chosen to board an AC bus from Vigan, after our experience on the way up, Chris and I were not entirely sure if we would make it all the way to Sagada in one afternoon. The bus driver told us to disembark at Tagudin, a small village in the middle of nowhere, along side the main road. From here we decided it was best to cross the road, down a street with a few shops, and search for some form of transport. Luckily we did come across a minivan, heading inland...

Amelia and I caught the first bus that came by to Vigan, from the main road running through San Juan. It was a rickety old bus with no luxuries whatsoever, and the driver was completely covered in oil too! We were unsure if we would actually make the hundred odd kilometres to Vigan. It turned out we didn't... not because it broke down, but because for some reason or another we were told to get off and transfer to a minibus. It was an odd situation, the bus as...

So it wasn't as straightforward as Chris and I thought, to just get a bus from Alaminos to San Juan. Our first bus, air conditioned, but standing room only, took us over an hour, to Dagupan. Since we were standing, we were unable to eat our breakfast, that we had bought from a street vendor in Alaminos. So boiled eggs and rice soup in hand, we swapped from one bus to another in Dagupan, but this time it was a 4x2 (4 seats one side, 2 seats the other), open wi...