Outdoor | GALAEROS

I love sunset. Whenever I go to new places, I look forward to watch the sun sets as the azure horizon turns gold to velvet then later devoured by complete darkness. It is like watching a fantasy movie in 3-D. But Tarak ridge summit is not a good place to experience such magical hour. Read on for you to find out.

Tarak ridge is located at Mariveles, Bataan with approximate elevation of 1,130 masl (meters above sea level), a major climb with 4/9 difficulty, trail class 3* the trail to summit will beat out the beast in you.

As soon as we arrived at Barangay Alas-Asin, we headed to Barangay Hall to register around 2:30 in the morning. Exactly 3:00 am we started our trek. First part of the trail was easy and we reached Papaya river after two and a half hours. We took our time, had our breakfast, dip in natural mini pool before heading back to trail. The start of the assault trail.

The Only Source of Water going to the camp site – Papaya River

From Papaya to the ridge is the second part of the trail where the real deal begins. Trails are very steep you may wt to use both hands to pull yourself up. After long hours of trekking we finally reached the ridge. We had our lunch, set up camp and rest before we go back to trail going to the summit for the much anticipated sunset.

Late afternoon, the strong wind from South China Sea started to bombard us as if telling us to go back now to the trail for the summit. So we started our trek full of anticipation of the magic hour.

Finally the summit! Behold, the majestic Mount Mariveles is in front of us, taunting. Behind is the sun, it is not even four in the afternoon yet we cannot see it because of huge mountain in front of us. We felt like children who received empty box of candy on Halloween.

With a weary heart and a little bit dismayed, we started our decent back to the camp. Somehow, not waiting for the sunset since we cannot see it anyway, and decent immediately was a good call. Soon enough halfway back to our camp, a thick fog started to clothe the entire peak and the trail which made our trek more difficult. Any small mishap could turn into disaster.

Since we were not able to witness the sunset, we decided to rest early so we can wake up early the next day for sunrise. Although sunset the day before was a shame, sunrise at the ridge worth everything.