It’s Marrietta Perez Bassig and Marissa Perez Bassig’s birthday today and the family had planned this trip some two weeks ago. It’s quite a long trip but not as long as our last trip to Manaoag, Pangasinan. My wife, my son, and I usually wake up late so our preparation turned out to be a rush. We didn’t even manage to have a decent breakfast.
There will be a three-vehicle convoy on this trip. Our white Hyundai Eon, Cobilla family’s red Hyundai Eon, and Ayiee Abella’s orange Toyota Vios.
Route to Remember
The following lines are a slightly detailed account of our road to Tagaytay. I chronicled them for reference if ever we go back.
We left Pines Village at 6:30 am. Traversing Sumulong Highway, we made a left at Katipunan Extension near a solemn Kia Metroeast Showroom, then made a right at Mount Vernon St., and made a left at the major road Mayor Gil Fernando Ave.
Straight from Mayor Gil Fernando, we made a right to Marcos Highway a.k.a. Marilaque Highway (Marilaque stands for Marikina-Rizal-Laguna-Quezon; I wonder how Laguna got in there).
From Marcos Highway we made our route to Pres. Diosdado Macapagal Bridge merging FVR Road. We then made a right to Eulogio Rodriguez Jr. Ave. merging C5 Road.
From hereon we traveled C5 Road straight to AH26 (Eulogio Rodriguez Jr. Ave. to Carlos P. Garcia Ave.) South Luzon Expressway Toll Road (a.k.a. Osmeña Sr. Highway). We kept going straight along SLEX then turned right to Mamplasan exit toll gate in Biñan, Calabarzon.
Upon leaving Mamplasan exit tollgate we made a right on Greenfield Parkway. After cruising straight Greenfield Parkway, we made a right turn to Sta. Rosa, Tagaytay Road, again just traveling a straight path.
We made a short stop over at a Petron, Dunkin Donuts station for some snacks and toilet.
We continued our route straight along Sta. Rosa, Tagaytay Road till we reached Tagaytay, Calamba Road by making a right.
Straight up Tagaytay-Calamba Road, we came upon a roundabout and entered Tagaytay-Nasugbu Highway from there.
Crowded Church
We made our very first major stop at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish. There are a lot of people today because tomorrow Monday is holiday (Eid al-Adha, Proclamation No. 56) and the parking lot was jam-packed to say the least. We couldn’t find a parking spot so a security guard just instructed us to position behind one nicely parked sedan. In this spot our car was actually blocking the sedan so it won’t be able get out of parking as long as we were behind it. I volunteered to be left behind while the rest of the family went inside the church, just in case the owner of the sedan comes and decides to leave the premises.
I had a short chit chat with a security guard that handled the parking. The number of people that came this Sunday awed him. A fellow colleague of his, a janitor was also overwhelmed. The janitor is from Cogeo, Antipolo. For work reasons, he stays with his brother here in Tagaytay and goes home to Cogeo on good days. He sometimes assists during church parades of Mother Mary.
The previous church mass ended after a few minutes, and I soon found myself parking our car in a suitable corner.
The front of the church, though crowded with people, is indeed stunning. Seemed like it was prepared for this day.
They even prepared a standee of Pope Francis.
The parish also has quite an astounding interior.
Skyranch Lunch and Bunch
After our church mass, we headed for Skyranch. There was no available parking inside the Skyranch common area so we were directed outside to a large parking area extension that was empty.
We decided to have lunch first before entering Skyranch. I took the liberty of taking a few shots while we were searching for a restaurant.
At last the family decided to test Leslie’s Restaurant.
Leslie’s, quite regrettably, had nothing much to offer with regards to the menu. While the food was typical, it’s not really that bad, but it’s not that good either. It’s just enough to satisfy my stomach and say I “might” come here again. The price? Well, it’s almost near the sky.
After our foodcapade, entering Skyranch was our next quest and it was a tough one as you can see from the long line of people in the admission area.
As soon as we got inside, we were in for some disappointment. It’s Marietta and Marissa’s birthday and there was supposed to be a promo where birthday celebrants can have a free ride-all-you-can pass for a minimum purchase. What we didn’t know was that the minimum purchase was actually ₱1,000. Senior citizens didn’t even have ride discounts. Everything became uneventful after that, but not all was lost. The kids had fun riding the ₱80/person Kiddie Train ride.
As I wrote this blog, I realized we should have tried looking for discounted ride-all-you-can passes from Metrodeal. Maybe we’ll do that the next time we have this idea again.
We then spent the next few hours eating and viewing people enjoying the rides. It was fun watching them shout their hearts out in some of the intense rides, like the Pirate Ship ride.
As the day wore off, we concluded it by doing a few site seeing and souvenir and goods hunting.
The Long And Hard Return
We got back in the parking lot at 5:00 pm. It was empty during the mid noon when we first got there but now it’s chock full. Made me think what time these travelers were planning to go home. Fortunately tomorrow’s a holiday.
Unfortunately, the traffic along the way was intense. What took us a few hours to travel early in the morning seemed like forever that afternoon. Actually, one gas bar would turn out two gas bars in the afternoon. That’s four litres in the morning and eight litres on the way back.
On our way to an exit tollgate to SLEX, we made a peculiar turn shown in the picture below. From what I observed, our turns from leaving and entering to SLEX would look like a number eight.
From Alabang, I made a mistake of exiting through Sucat tollgate so we routed Service Road to C5 in order to get to McDonald’s Sports Complex, which was our destination for dinner. We got to McDonald’s past 10:00 pm. I heartily ate a chicken ala king meal which subtly reminded me of the AlDub phenomenon.
It was a peaceful trip home after McDonald’s and we stepped back in the house at 11 pm. The gas bar indeed registered two bar decrease as compared to a single bar from the early morning trip. But enough of gas consumption worries for now. It sure is good to be back home, kiss the day goodbye, and lay down our heads on a pillow.