Bontoc

23rd Dec 2008 - We arrived in Bontoc around 2pm after a 2 hours plus bumpy jeepney ride from Sagada...I miss it already! Bontoc is busier and bigger than Sagada but it lacks personality. All i see are rows of shops and lines of buses / jeepneys. This town reminds me of a big bus station.

We decided to check out some stone walled rice terraces of Maligcong. Looking for the jeepney to Maligcong was a pain as there are no signboards. You just "have to know". It seems all the jeepneys/buses in Bontoc are situated either north/south/east/west point from the main street. Like I said, one big big bus station.

We found our jeepney, and had to wait a half hour until the jeepney was full before the driver arrived. When i say full, i mean literally overflowing to the point there were up to 6 passengers on the jeepney roof, 8 of us inside, 3 in front, 2 standing at the back!

The ride took a whole hour, and in all the 'bumpiness' of the ride, one of the passenger fell off from the roof! The driver wasn't aware till we kinda yelled for him to stop!! He then reversed the jeepney and we panicked for fear of him driving over the poor guy!

The poor man who fell off was still laying on the ground when we got to him. He sustained a bit of a scalp wound and some lacerations on his arm, but other than that he refused to get to the hospital! We were just happy that he was still walking and breathing...

We finally reached Maligcong...the rice terraces were quite a sight...even if they were already harvested and appeared to look like multilayered swimming pools...