These are some notes that I made during the day we spent at Villa Escudero:
We’ve had lunch — about 10:30 — at the waterfall. A river was dammed up and the water runs over the dam down into the river gorge. Tables have been set up in the river in the gorge. That’s where you eat, with water up to your ankles running over your feet. It did cool off the feet! Of course, I don’t have appropriate attire. So, I rolled up the pant legs and left the shoes and socks on shore and waded in for lunch.
Lunch was buffet style with chicken, pork, and fish plus several kinds of fruit. Since I had no breakfast, it tasted pretty good.
The doesn’t seem to be much more here to see after the museum. The pool complex is large with three different pools. One is for the children, the other two for adults or bigger children. It’s bright sun in the pools so only the diehards are in the pool. One of the Pocatello guys has bright, white skin. He’ll be a lobster pretty soon. There isn’t much more to do here, so I’m going to find better shade with a real chair, and get a Sprite.
It’s just 5 p.m. We’re getting on the bus to head back. The afternoon did include a cultural arts show from 2 until about 3:30. It was pretty good. I managed to find a good sitting place after the show.
The name of this place is Villa Escudero Plantation and Resort. Swimming and related volleyball or basketball is the main draw. It was mostly families or large work groups. You were generally expected to show up in the earlier morning and stay at least to mid-afternoon. It’s far enough away that coming for just a couple of hours is impractical. Those that went swimming got sunburned and will feel it tomorrow.
This was a plantation of the Escudero family. The originator came from Spain, married a Filipino woman here and never returned to Spain. He had one son who did the major development of the coconut plantation. The originator came over shortly after the Spanish were awarded the Philippines in the early 1500’s by the Pope when he divided up the new world between Spain and Portugal. Apparently it’s still a working plantation and this resort is in a small part of the estate.
I think we’re stopping for dinner somewhere….
It’s 7:30 and we’ve been in heavy traffic for the past hour. It’s solid traffic both ways moving at about 10 mph in fits and starts. We haven’t stopped for dinner yet, but that’s supposed to be Real Soon Now.
We did make a short stop about 5:45 for 10 minutes in San Pablo at a place looking out over a lake and some fish farms. The area does a lot of tourist business because of the seven lakes around the area and the tall, dormant volcanoes to be climbed. Mt. Makiling has three peaks and Mt. Banahaw is supposed to have mystical healing powers in it’s springs and streams. The town was setting up for their annual celebration which starts on Monday.
Then just as suddenly, we turned into the area where the hotel is located! It was after 8 p.m. and the decision was made to skip dinner and just go home. That was just fine with me! We were dropped off at our hotel and we had a small dinner about 9 p.m. and then off to bed. The day was good, actually. I certain that I wouldn’t have made any better use of it than going over to the plantation. I saw a lot of countryside that I would otherwise not have seen. Spending the time with the local staff was a lot of fun. And my first week in Manila has come to an end.
Good day, Roland! My family and I had just gone to Villa Escudero (for the 1st time)last May 12-13, 2006. It was such a very wonderful experience to see its beauty under the Sun and Rain. On our first day it was sunny. So we just enjoyed the carabao ride, the sumptous lunch with rice wrapped in banana leaves, chicken, beef, pork and fish. We also watched the cultural show in the afternoon while the kids are enjoying their pool bath. We are blessed that at around 4PM the rain started to fall. Just the same, we enjoyed the raft ride and the bath in the pool until 6PM. We occupied the Riverside Hut so the more we were impressed of how close to nature the sorroundings are. In the evening, the rain started to fall hard, and still we were unaware that there was already a strong typhoon heading to our place – Quezon Province. Thank God, we still had a sound sleep the whole evening. It was in the morning when we saw the damage the typhoon had caused – leaves and branches of trees are scattered around, no electricity, all the staff are busy roaming around clearing the areas, no more carabao ride just jeepney, – the commendable thing is, one of the owners of the villa was also roaming around as early as 6AM checking the guests if they are okay, the breakfast was still served hot and deliciously, and the satff are still as friendly as before we came in. We then headed home at around 11:30AM but despite the weather, we still managed to drop by at my mother’s hometown in Lousianna, Laguna were we took a view of Laguna Bay, Mt.Banahaw and Mt. Makiling in Los Banos. It was a very wonderful summer (con ‘rainy’) vacation with the whole family – to see the beauty of God’s creation in just a short trip. God Bless You and regards to your family. – eden (from the Philippines)