Pagsanjan Falls: A ‘Shower’ to Cherish

Pagsanjan Falls

Three weeks passed by in setting down in Metro Manila and it was time to explore the country. Being an island nation, I expected most of the places of interest centered around water bodies so it was little wonder that our first trip to the country was to Pagsanjan Falls, around 70 km south east of Manila. 
Six of us planned to make the day-trip on a Saturday. I joined my colleagues Avadhoot, Shiv and Pasha along with Poonam and Shweta, the respective better halves of Avadhoot and Shiv.
We set-off late after a relaxed Saturday morning sleep. We boarded a bus from Pasay bus-stop and our destination was Santa Cruz. The bus-ride was around one and a half hours through the highway, followed by a bit of the Philippines country-side and finally to Santa Cruz.  We passed a couple of small towns on the way and I noticed that the markets were selling lot of products related to swimming which gave the indication that being in the water bodies was the favorite pastime of the area. We reached Santa Cruz at around 1 PM, a modest small town. We had to now take a unique mode of transport which would take us to the river side from where a boat-ride would take us to the falls. The unique mode of transport was a ‘tri-cycle’ which was built on a unique ‘jugaad’ technology which would put even Indians to shame. It is basically a bike with a ‘Sholay’ type side-car but the entire structure has a covered tinned roof which would give the riders a sense of utterly false security. One person is expected to be pillion on the back of the bike and two people would take the side-car.  As we set-off, I had the heart in my mouth for a few moments as it miraculously picked up speed and edged forward without sending us into orbit. We were soon by the river-side. It was more of a canal and there were tourists moving on the boat towards the falls. We had to take two boats as each boat can accommodate three people. Shiv, Shweta and I took one boat. 

Reaching the Falls

We would be joined by our guide Manalo who was in his uniform of the agency that was supplying the boat. We had to pay 1350 Pesos per head for the boat ride and back along with the gear which contained a life-jacket and a plastic helmet. We set-off soon after changing into our clothes which we brought along with us for getting wet. The initial phase was calm and we were pulled by a motor boat for some distance. We would be going against the flow and hence it would be a long two-hour ride.  After a few minutes, the rocks appeared, the motor boat vanished and Manalo got into action literally carrying the boat along the rocks.

Remarkable Manalo through the Rocks

This was brilliant stuff from the relative old man as he jumped in and out of the boat gripped his foot on the rocks and pushed the boat forward against the tide and carrying the weight of three people. There was one person at the back as well who was supporting him but still this was remarkable stuff. On the way we had many boats returning downstream and at times there would be room for only one boat to squeeze in through the rocks. The high point of the journey was a lunch break right at the half-way mark. It was a small make-shift restaurant serving barbecue chicken. It was the most thrilling experience of having freshly made barbecue chicken with sound of the rumbling at the background. We walked around on the rocks and clicked a few photographs on the backdrop of a waterfall. After a relaxed lunch, we set off again. The rocks increased and now there were held by iron rods. The boat had to be lifted on the rods and moved forward. It was all too remarkable a job being done by our guides.  We were moving through a gorge and it was green all around and looked like as if we are flowing through a brook in between two mountains. We passed through the rocks and finally reached our destination to have the first look at the falls. 

On the Raft

The falls were not anything big. It was just one huge jet of water flowing through the rocks and that made it manageable to reach there in a raft boat and have a shower. We had to keep our cameras and other stuff back in the safe custody of Manalo and since he showed his skills at handling the DSLR camera, we assigned him the responsibility to click our pictures while we were on our way on the raft to take a shower under the falls. This would one hell of an experience which would be beyond words and so I will let the photographs do the talking. Each raft would carry around 13-15 people and would take you right through the waterfall where for a few seconds the water and all its speed and weight would wash you down. It was all too thrilling as we approached the fall, then the noise went up, the spray increased and then it was thousand buckets of water falling on you. I had to remove my shades and there was hardly any space to breathe so had to look down and make some space available for the air to flow in. On passing the water, behind it was a cave with rocks where we got out of the raft for a while and moved around after which we were soon on our way back through the fall once again. We had one more shower and this one was even heavier than the one on our onward way. Soon we were back and out of the raft. The thrill was not over. We left the raft but straight into the water, not on the land. We enjoyed every minute of the thrill and suddenly the rocky lake felt like a swimming pool. All of us went in.  All this while Manalo was clicking us all in the mess and we unexpectedly captured the most important moments. Soon he signified to us to hurry up as it was getting dark and hence we wound up our aquatic activities and were on the boat. The return ride was relatively easier as it was downstream and the speed was a notch higher.  We safely arrived at the place where we started from and soon changed into our original dry clothes. We travelled back to the bus stop on the ‘tri-cycle’ and found a road-side coffee shop to have some most-welcome coffee after the wet experience. We managed to board the 7 PM bus and were back to Metro Manila. To round off this fantastic trip, we had a sumptuous dinner at the New Bombay restaurant.