Baguio? You mean.. La Union!

Feb 23-24 were marked as the yearly Baguio Flower Festival. Apparently there were parades of flowered floats and general enjoyments to be had that weekend, so Ryan invited some of us to partake in the enjoyment. Since it was right before a national holiday, i thought why not? Ok I lied, it really doesn't take a lot of effort to convince me to go on weekend adventures. Unfortunately, many people flaked out so it ended up being me, him, Lauren (engineer I met just a few days before) and Krystal's friend Jackie, who was vacationing from her teaching job in Korea. Krystal couldn't actually come but she sent her friend to spend the weekend with us. My cousin KM and her boyfriend were also going to come, but she had work till later so they were supposed to follow up.

When we got to the bus station, it was ridiculously crowded and buses were booked till 5am. It took about an hour for us just to get to the ticket booth. On a whim, Ryan said "We should just go to La Union instead!" well.. why not? So we transferred to another bus station and immediately booked tickets. (La Union is a beach town in the northern province, known for good surfing.) Along the way, I kept in contact with KM to make sure she got to the destination ok. To my dismay, she texted me at 2am saying that she's on the way to Baguio after all.

My bus crew (Ryan, Jackie & Lauren) and I touched down at La Union around... 3am. We parked ourselves on the beach while Ryan tried to find a room for us, but no luck as it happened that we had gone there on a surf competition weekend and all of the hotels were booked. We contented ourselves with napping on the beach and watching a beautiful sunrise.


a father takes his kids out for a morning walk



We finally were able to get a room and played around on the beach for a while and watched the surf competition. Later on, we walked around the market in San Fernando. Since we were prepared for the mountains, we didn't have many warm weather clothes. Jackie and I were in search of a bathing suit and Ryan had to find flip flops. Palenke's are quite fun to explore, as you can find lots of random things there that you may or may not need.


Ryan & Jackie on our way to San Fernando. We got attacked with a zinc stick on the beach just prior.

During the evening, we ended up hanging by the water and drinking beers while waiting for some bands to play on a stage.




We also met up with Zara (pictured top left) who was there to practice her surfing. Unfortunately, we three girls were just too exhausted from the day's adventures that we went to bed early. Ryan watched the bands and hung out with the drunk guys on the beach.


surfer dude

Lauren and Jackie both had to leave a day early since Lauren had to work and Jackie had a flight the next day. Ryan and I decided to go to Baguio to meet with KM. We had lunch at Cafe by the Ruins. Mmm hot chocolate






KM ended up buying a puppy in Baguio and named it Hegel/Reggae/Reggie/puppy. We played babysitters the rest of the weekend. I'd like to call him Napster, curiouser and curiouser but too lazy to do anything about it.


It turns out we wouldn't have missed the parade after all, but it was hard to leave La Union earlier than I had to. In fact, there was some ambivalence about staying in Baguio so we ended up getting on the bus back to La Union for another night of fun and relaxation. KM took surfing lessons and I just chilled by the beach with Hegel.

checking out the hot surfer guys?


my sentiments exactly...