M.a.P's Trip #1 - Laguna Loop Part 1!

At exactly one month after that unforgettable Rizal-Laguna trip, the pseudo-twins decided to put the recent Muslim holiday to good use.  We visited the old churches again and made sure to drop by the other places that we missed.  And in that trip, A asked his high school classmates to join us.  O diba, the more, the mannier? J

As usual, we spent the entire day cam-whoring and since I already posted all the Rizal and Laguna churches during the first trip, I’ll just post the photos of the stuff that caught my interest in this trip.

And so Magellan and Pigafetta started the journey at 6am…

I knew that A drove to Marikina after picking me up at the apartment so I was shocked to see this…is this still an Ondoy aftermath?  Or so I thought…

Well, it just happened to be the first stop…for breakfast.  I love Pan de Americana.  Maybe it’s because I’m more of a breakfast person for simple “silog” meals paired with freshly brewed coffee can already make me happy.



Ilocos Longganisa Breakfast



Right after breakfast, the troop headed straight to Morong…the home of St. Jerome church.  We decided to explore further this time…we climbed the church’s spiral staircase to get a view of the altar from the second floor. 

There were kids playing at the time and they said that we can actually go to the bell tower.  Unfortunately, the door that leads to it was locked so we just went on to our next destination.

The church door was closed when we got to Baras so the caretakers guided us to the side entrance.  Went to the second floor again…but I wasn’t thinking about the bell tower.  I just had to take a closer shot of the bats hanging from the ceiling.  I wouldn’t want to be seated directly beneath them…you can never tell when they’d decide to relieve themselves. J

Apparently, Baras doesn’t use the bell in the bell tower…because just as we were about to drive off…we saw this by the church office entrance.

I knew they were there but didn’t give much attention but aren't they beautiful, enchanting even. (baka may kapre!) There stood the two century-old acacia trees in the Tanay Church grounds.

And there were old tombstones inside the church…which probably belong to the wealthy residents of Tanay back in the day.  Most of them were even written in Spanish.














Remember the story of the middle retablo that was painted gold by the former parish priest?  I thought it was just hearsay but I was made to believe otherwise after the story was confirmed by the manang whom I had a little chat with.  I even took a closer look at the other retablos and I just realized that original color of white and aquamarine are the colors of the Blessed Virgin Mary (as taught by the Catholic church).  Gold?  What was that priest thinking? Cher, probably. :-D