The Road to Gumaca, Quezon

A few weeks before Holy Week, I asked my cousins what their plans are for the break. Specifically, I asked them if they want to come over at our place to hang out. I was thinking of taking photos of my niece and nephew. However, they already made plans to visit my cousin Jo-Ann's in laws in Gumaca, Quezon. She then asked us if we'd like to tag along. My other cousin Jojo and his family are also coming. I was hesitant at first as I wanted to rest and avoid the Holy Week traffic, specially in SLEX. After a while, I warmed up to the idea, helped by Ariel's enthusiasm. After all, it's been a while since our last road trip. A plan was formed.

A few days before Good Friday, we started talking about what to bring. Basically, I didn't have to worry about bringing anything as they will just take care of the food. I also found out that another cousin, Ate Mylee, and her family will come, too!

We met at the Caltex station in SLEX, just after the Carmona exit where we got out from Cavite. Aside from me and Ariel, we were joined by Jo-Ann, Alfred and their daughter Jana; Ate Mylee, Nonie and their twin sons Nathan and Nirel; Jojo, Richel and their little boy Riley. Jo-Ann's sis and brother in law, Renren and Alvin, also decided to join us in this trip to visit their parents. It took our 4-car convoy about 3 hours to get to Gumaca town proper. It was a long, but pleasant drive. Traffic was light and the roads were good. We met Alfred's dad, Tito Tony, in the town proper, and Alfred and his siblings first dropped by their grandparents' house while we waited in our car. After a while, we drove on to the farm. It was about 10 minutes from the town proper. We took a left from the main highway into a dirt road which we later learned was specifically bulldozed off to create access to Tito Tony's farm.

Tony's Hog Farm is actually the retirement home of Alfred's parents. They have a spacious house sitting on the side of a hilly terrain, surrounded by coconut trees and other fruit bearing plants and trees. Chickens were scattered all over the perimeter. A carabao was grazing nearby, and 30 pigs were corralled in a pen only a few meters away from the house.

The house was big for just two people. Clearly, it was built with vacationing kids and grandkids in mind. The house was designed with cemented roof deck instead of the usual iron roof. Glass tiles were strategically positioned all over the roof to let natural light into the house. This saves a lot of energy from using electric bulbs. The entire house was furnished with bamboo furnitures.

All bedrooms have doors leading out of the house, much like a beach cottage. The master bedroom has its own huge bathroom with hot shower. A bamboo-framed king-sized bed sits in the middle of the room. The space is big enough to accommodate another king-sized mattress and two single mattresses. Ten of us shared this room for the night.

The 2nd bedroom is a bit smaller but still quite spacious. It is furnished with a queen-sized bed and had enough space for another mattress. Tito Tony, Tita Cherry, Alvin, Jojo, Richel and Riley stayed here for the night.

Tita Cherry's sister as well as Jana's yaya Gina stayed in the 3rd bedroom which is furnished with a double bed. There is a second bathroom, as big as the master bath, in between the two smaller bedrooms.

The dining table is made for eight people but it was big enough to squeeze in 12 of us. Our first meal was sinigang na baboy and fried stuffed squid. The sumptuous lunch was made even more delectable with the happy chatter among us cousins and our gracious host. After lunch, we retreated to the bedroom to take naps since we woke up very early for the trip. However, instead of napping, we girls ended up watching a movie and chatting over junk food.

Time seemed to slow down in this sleepy farm. At around 4pm, we went out to explore the entire perimeter. We explored the rice field just a few meters from the house. We had to walk uphill through a trail and go down again into the rice field.

After a while, we all congregated at the roof deck for snacks of banana and camote Q, more chatter, and lots of snapshots.

For dinner, we had Tita Cherry's famous adobong baboy cooked in vinegar until the meat is fork tender. The best!!! It was paired with fried chicken and steaming white rice (brown rice for me).

After dinner, we shared coffee and trooped to the roof deck again to gaze at the stars. The sky was so clear and was dotted with the most stars we've ever seen. The roof looks really pretty with the glass tiles glowing with light coming from inside the house. We had fun posing for photos in the dark.

Every Saturday, at around 2pm, one of the pigs get slaughtered and the meat sold to regular customers. This is how Tito Tony earns from his pig farm. As we retired for the night, we talked about waking up at 2am to see the slaughter. Well, it didn't happen. Most of us heard the cries of a pig about to be slaughtered but we were too tired to get up. By the time I opened my eyes, the sun was shining brightly through the glass tiles on the roof. We roamed around the house first and took photos.

Breakfast was fried rice, daing na bangus and tomato-onion omelette with garlic fried rice. YUMMY! After breakfast, we got ready to go to the beach. Our plan was to look for a clean strip of sandy beach and just stop for a quick dip. Sadly, the shoreline was littered with garbage. It took us a while to find a suitable area for even a few snapshots. At first, the kids didn't even want to step on the sand. They eventually got the hang of it and was able to play a bit - but they didn't want to get wet. I don't blame them. With all the floating trash on the water, it is kinda icky to get yourself wet. We at least were able to take some nice photos.

After about an hour of beach time, we headed back to the house for lunch. Our last meal at the farm consisted of grilled liempo with fresh meat from the early morning slaughter, and steamed prawns. By this time, I totally ditched my brown rice and ate the steaming white rice along with everyone else. We rested a bit and packed our stuff to prepare for our drive back to the crowded city life.

By 4pm, our convoy left the farm premises. We stopped by the Gumaca church for some photos before leaving for home.

We were a bit sad to leave Gumaca. We had a great time at the farm and we were very thankful for Tito Tony and Tita Cherry's hospitality.

l-r: Nonie, Nirel, Ate Mylee, Nathan, Gina, Alfred, Jo-Ann, Jana, Renren, Alvin, Tito Tony, Tita Cherry, Richelle, Jojo, Ariel, Alby (not in photo: Riley who's asleep in the car)

We stopped in San Pablo for a bit of shopping (Richelle bought a stainless grill), and then in SLEX for dinner and coffee. Traffic was a bit heavy in Sto. Tomas Batangas area until the Star Toll exit - perhaps due to the Holy Week crowd heading back to Manila from the beaches of Batangas. We got home at past 11pm - longer than our trip going to Gumaca.

We all had a wonderful time and made plans to make this an annual trip - if not more frequent. It was great to bond with my cousins again. It was a reunion of some sorts for the Starex gang (We've gone to Sagada and climbed Mt. Pulag together, and another roadtrip here. We missed joining the group in their trip to Bicol and Coron.). Since the kids were born, we had not gone on a trip together and this is probably the closest we'll get to another adventure. We have Riley and Jana as the newest additions to the gang, plus ate Mylee's family joined us for the first time. We're all definitely looking forward to the next adventure.

A Weekend Roadtrip

Ariel has been inviting me to spend a weekend at Clark but I just couldn’t see the merits of the place. That is until I got to spend a few days there on business. I realized that Pampanga offers some of the country’s best culinary experiences. Not to mention Duty Free shopping.

So, now it’s my turn to bug Ariel to spend a weekend there. What better time than our 114th Monthsary? Fortunately, the 18th of October fell on a Saturday, perfect for an overnight weekend out of town.

On the morning of the 18th, we began our two and a half hour drive to the province of Pampanga. We made leisurely stops along the way and spent a wonderful weekend together.

We had an itinerary and we planned to make a stop at Mely’s Sisig – said to be the best Kapampangan Sisig in town, located at San Fernando. The web information said that it’s a very small carinderia that has no sign. Well, it must have been well-hidden so we completely missed it.

Our alternative was RFW, home of the best Tokwa’t Baboy, as well as Palabok and Halo-Halo. As I have been there a couple of times already, it was pretty easy to locate it. I wanted Ariel to taste the tokwa’t baboy but unfortunately, it was unavailable. Just our luck!!! So, we proceeded to Zapata’s instead for our lunch. It’s one of the best Mexican restaurants I’ve tried – better than those in Manila – and I want Ariel to experience it as well.

The interior of Zapata’s is quite cozy. The lighting is slightly dimmed and the interiors a rainbow of Mexican colors. The walls are painted a sunny yellow and the entire restaurant is decorated with colorful ornaments like Mexican hats, chili peppers, and colorful textiles. Some parts of the walls are painted with phrases written in the Spanish language. We picked a table near a window so we would have enough natural light for taking photos of the food.


The selection wasn’t long. It was just a page of food options, the usual stuff – Nachos with salsa, Tacos, Fajitas, Burrito, etc. Since it was my second time here, it was easier for me to order – I just made sure I tried a different one from my last visit. Ariel, as usual, took a bit more time to order. He’s not very adventurous with food but I could see that he wanted to venture out of his comfort zone. If we came for dinner, we would have ordered some alcoholic beverages. But it was midday so we just opted for some sodas – perfect for the Mexican-spiced dishes we ordered.

Ariel ordered the Mahi-Mahi with Mexican Rice. Between the two of us, Ariel is less experimental and would tend to get the safe option. The Mahi-Mahi is already an adventurous choice for him. On the contrary, while I am more adventurous when it comes to food, I opted for Beef Fajitas which is among my usual fare. I love the act of putting together the Fajitas on a piece of pita bread. A bit of salsa and sour cream, some grilled onions and bellpepper, add the strips of beef and the Mexican Rice. Roll and enjoy! After our main meal, Ariel ordered a slice of American Apple Pie. Yummy! Thus officially begun our Pampanga food and shopping trip.




After lunch, we checked into Oxford Hotel. We got a room with King Sized bed. This is the cheapest hotel we found inside the Clark Freeport zone. We figured we just need a place to sleep as we will be out most of the day anyway. We quickly realized why it was affordable. Customer service is practically non-existent. Nobody greeted us at the entrance. No one helped us with our bags. We only had one overnight bag but I brought my DSLR and my laptop so we had a few pieces of luggage in tow. After checking in at the front desk, no one ushered us into our room.

The hotel, though still practically new at 2 years old, looked unkempt. The hallway was dreary and there was a musty smell. Our room was quite large, but sparsely furnished and decorated. There’s a ref but nothing inside – though we got two bottles of complimentary water. There’s a dresser table but no lighting above it. The bathroom had basic amenities – bath & hand towels, toilet paper, bath soap and shampoo, and a hair dryer. There was no trashcan in the bathroom so I just got the one under the dresser table. Because we started the day early, we were quite sleepy by the time we checked in. So we spent the better part of the afternoon napping in our room.

At 4pm, we were ready to conquer Duty Free Shopping! We were able to buy an assortment of household stuff, sporting goods, and imported canned goods and confectionery. By 6pm, our SUV was filled with shopping bags. The only thing we weren’t able to buy at that point were the Christmas ornaments I saw at my last visit. Oh well, there’s still tomorrow, but at that point, we were raring to have dinner. We didn’t have snacks so we were a bit famished.

After a quick shower, we got dressed for our Monthsary dinner. We had a reservation at 7:30pm. C Italian Dining was just a few minutes away so we made it in time. We opted to get seats inside the air-conditioned room rather than al fresco at the garden. It was a bit humid and we wanted to be comfortable. The interior was tastefully done, with modern furnishings and adequate lighting. Framed paintings line the wall. The table setting was quite casual. The guests were mainly adults with some families with small kids.

We started with some wine. We were very hungry so we waited for the toasted bread and pesto dip before taking a sip of the Sauvignon Blanc. They have an extensive menu and we can only try so much for the evening. Good thing I had friends who recommended some of the bestsellers.


C Italian Dining’s claim to fame is their unique Panizza. We opted for the Kristina Panizza which came highly recommended by friends and even our very helpful waitress. The Panizza base is made from very thin crust pizza with 5 types of cheeses. Kristina Panizza has ham and bacon toppings, as well as caramelized onions and roasted mushrooms. It is served sliced in long strips with a bowl of arugula and alfalfa sprouts. Then you put some arugula and alfalfa on the panizza, roll it and enjoy the explosion of flavor and texture in your mouth. Ariel doesn’t like arugula at all, so he started with just the alfalfa sprouts. But seeing me enjoy my roll of panizza convinced him to try and he enjoyed it immensely. We were able to clean up our plates along with the bowl of greens.





We also ordered a pasta dish called Penne Roberto. It’s a cream-based pasta with Gorgonzola cheese, roasted chicken and garlic and sundried tomatoes. We ordered one serving split into two plates. The serving was huge, even at half order each plate. It was served with toasted bread, and they did not scrimp on the chicken. Since we are already almost full with the panizza, we set the chicken aside and just ate the pasta soaked in the creamy sauce.
Ariel and I both had a second glass of the Sauvignon Blanc, which made our dinner even more enjoyable.


Cheers to our 114 months together, and wishing for more happy months to come.

After dinner, we had some drinks back at the hotel. I had a glass of margarita while Ariel opted for his usual San Mig Light. We checked our emails and just spent a few minutes chatting.

We had a leisurely breakfast on Sunday morning. The breakfast buffet wasn’t good and we finally decided that the extra cost of staying in a nicer hotel is really worth it, on account of the breakfast buffet. Nonetheless, we still had a good time so it was ok.

After breakfast, I met with a scrapper friend who showed me some yummy stuff fresh from Scrapbooks Hawaii. Then it was off to more shopping. We bought some Christmas ornaments for my winter inspired Christmas tree this year.

We had lunch at RFW in Angeles City. It was abit disappointing as their Tokwa’t Baboy was still unavailable. We just settled with the Palabok and Halo-Halo which were very good, though we were really hoping to have the tokwa’t baboy here.

Anyway, our weekend ended with an hour of full body massage in the comfort of our own bedroom courtesy of our usual pair of masseuse – Rose and Ivy. They come to our condo every Sunday for our weekly massage and I couldn’t think of a better way to soothe our travel-exhausted bodies.

Til our next road/food trip!

Check out the complete set of photos here or here.

I also made a mini for this roadtrip. I submitted it as an entry to Bookoto's Show Me The Mini challenge. View it here.