December 8, 2014

Quick Escape: Baguio

A change of scenery once in a while is good to refresh the mind and body.  Tired of work, I took the opportunity to go to another city for a quick escape.  I went to Baguio.


When I started using the food+adventure tag of this blog, my original plan was list all the places I visited, cost I incurred, food and resto where I ate and dined and directions but...it's not happening so I guess my adventure will be sort of like a photo diary and Baguio is known for flowers (and strawberry, ube, cold weather and taxi drivers who give change up to the last peso)!  Below are my favorite shots.





And there's cacti, succulents and beautiful plants too.


I also went to the public market which is the driest and cleanest I've been (ohhh Salcedo Market is an exception by the way) where we (I'm with my sister) bought fresh strawberries and ube and strawberry jam.  I got tempted to buy honey and vegetables too because it's cheap there, but I don't want to bring too much stuff back to Manila aside from the cactus and succulent I bought.


Raisin Bread from Baguio Country Club is the best and the Ube Jam from Good Shepherds is the yummiest.  Not much of a fan of strawberry jam but glad that we bought one that has lots of strawberry chunks on it.

And of course we went to Burnham Park to stroll and look at the colorful bicycle.


We passed by Casa Vallejo and went inside the coffee shop and bookstore adjacent to the hotel.



Casa Vallejo is a historical structure that survived World War II that is now in danger of being erased in the city's map.  It's sad that part of a history will be destroyed (hopefully not) for development.  Yes, it is not wrong to strive for growth and development but removing the charms of the place is like taking my childhood memories away breaking my identity into half.  While my photos above are beautiful with flowers, here's what Baguio look like from SM:

Baguio is now a polluted and disorganized city (in my eyes), the picture above looks like a landfill.  This saddens me since I have fond memories of Baguio when I was a little...the fresh smell of pine trees, the cold breeze, the fog and the clouds just above my head and the picturesque view of the mountains.


I believe it's not yet too late and there are concern citizens that are taking action in order to restore the charm of Baguio.  I'm praying for them.

6 comments:

  1. It’s always refreshing when we change environments! I think we should make the most of it, even if things don’t go as we planned.
    You visited a truly beautiful place filled with so many lovely flowers and SRAWBERRIES!!! I just love strawberries and they look so yummy, but here in winter there are no strawberries!!!!!!!! They do sell strawberry jam though… I think I will buy some tomorrow, because I’m really craving it now.
    It’s always a shame when historical sites are destroyed “in the name of progress”! Some things just need to be there to keep remind us of what happened, good or bad. It brakes my heart when I look at certain places and see how different they have became. Sometimes it seems as if my childhood didn’t even exist!!!

    I also want to apologize for my absence, but a lot of bad things have happened, it’s been hard to deal with and I couldn’t blog about it and warn everyone, because it’s very personal and I don’t want certain people to know that I might be with a depression. So for that I’m truly sorry. I didn’t even check or updated the social networks. But I’m back for good and it feels so good to talk to everyone again.

    Hope you are doing well and very Happy Holidays!
    Kisses and take care!

    http://momodicted.blogspot.pt/

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  2. I spent my weekend in Baguio too. I've been there many times but ube is not very common to me. Perhaps because it's expensive compared to other pampasalubong they have. I didn't know that bookstore, is it a nice place? If yes I will try to visit too.

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    1. Ube jam is yum specially the good shepherds. The bookstore is very cozy and if ever that I'll have my own library, I would imagine something similar. They sell filipino books

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  3. look at those flowers! so pretty :) i havent been to baguio in a long time now, if i go ill make sure to drop by their strawberry farm. how much ung honey sa kanila sis?

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    1. strawberry farm!!! but it's not season daw when I went to Baguio. Yung honey half the price compared dito sa manila

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