Climbing Gulugod-baboy doesn’t require too much technical skills in hiking. This 530 MASL rough terrain in Anilao, Mabini, Batangas is precisely a good mountain for newbies. Likewise, the jump off, Philpan Dive Resort is very accessible and connected in the downtown by a well-paved road and readily available transportation (jeepney or tricycle).
The hike was just 2 hours and as far as I remember, the only challenging part is the steep concrete road from the resort to the trail head. The hard concrete is quite painful and stressful to leg and knee muscles. The blind curves of the road is also dangerous to climbers, thus extra caution should be observed. As a matter of fact, in one of our climb, one of the participants almost got hit by a speedy down moving motorcycle. The rest of the trail is very manageable as long as climbers are well-prepared to deal with the scorching heat of the sun.
(Thanks Sir Mervs Alarcon for the photo)
One student shared that he was very happy, because after 6 years in DLSU-D; this was the first time that he felt that there are people who could believe in his capability. He was shared that the activity gave him hope to could go back to the trail towards his summit of success. Another student shared that he was inspired to strive harder and to acquire discipline he needed to face the academic challenges. Someone shared that he is looking forward to be a mountaineer soon.
I could confidently say that the hike had great impact to the participants, and my simple basis were improved academic performance of significant numbers of participants and after three years, a lot were into mountaineering now.