Banaue Rice Terraces - the Ultimate Experience

For some unimportortant reason we took an unpardonable decision to spend only 10 days in the Philippines. And when we discovered that we love the country it was too late to change our tickets. So we decided that we would at least visit northern Luzon - the main island, on which Manila is situated.

We started off in the direction of the Cordillera mountains to the town of Banaue, where we wanted to see the world famous rice terraces. To our surprise, it turned out that the travel time between Manila and Banaue (the distance of less than 350km) is 8 to 9 hours, and the buses depart only at night because during the day the travel time would be significantly longer.

Once we arrived, though, we knew instantly that the night in the bus was entirely worth it. The rice terraces in the Cordilleras are THE ULTIMATE rice terraces one can see. The Cordilleras are inhabited mainly by the native tribes of Ifugao people who have their own language, customs and traditions and none of the countries which at one point or another colonized the Philippines have left any mark on their villages buried in the mountains.

Between 3rd and 2nd century BC the Ifuago people conducted a huge engineering project - they turned slopes of the mountains surrounding their villages into rice terraces. The terraces cover the total surface of almost 10,400 square km. The irrigation system, using water from the rain forest on the top of the mountains and distributing it through pipes made of bamboo is still working today in the same way as it worked 2000 years ago. And the knowledge of maintenance of the terraces is transferred orally between generations.

However, the image is not all rosy. In 1995 UNESCO recognized the terrace as a world heritage site and, consequently, tourists became interested in visiting the place. The Ifugau people quickly discovered that tourist business is far more lucrative than hard work in rice paddies. Within a few years more and more terraces became abandoned and subject to erosion.

Apparently UNESCO in recent years provided subsidies to the farmers working in rice fields, so that this ancient cultural heritage doesn't disappear in a few decades. It looks like recognizing the terraces as a national heritage site may be a double-edge sword. The Filipino government also provided special funds for the maintenance of the terraces. Since a portion of that money remains in the pockets of officials, one can ask how much money really reaches down to the farmers. But that is another question. The good news, however, is that many of the abandoned terraces were indeed restored recently and the sights are still truly amazing.

In fact, Marc and I were charmed with the region beyond our expectations. And instead of racing through the rest of the island and spending half of our trip in long distance buses, we decided to stay in the Ifugao region and do some serious trekking. We didn't regret it one minute. We saw some traditional villages practically untouched by tourism, where the only visible concessions to the 21st (or even 20th) century are modern clothes. And we hiked through beautiful mountains and rice terraces. I could easily imagine staying in this region for two weeks. If only my calves would allow me. Because let me tell you - walking through the rice terraces is no easy task. The only paths are either horizontal or vertical. And there is only a certain number of stone steps one can climb in one day :-)