That Traveling Couple

I’ve gotta be honest, Batad, in Northern Luzon, Philippines is perhaps my favorite place on earth.

And it’s not just the Batad Rice Terraces that are the highlight, it’s everything about the place, from when you arrive to when you leave. In this post I wanted to give you a rundown on the 2 days we spent at Batad in the hope that you can get there and enjoy it as much as we did…

So Batad is a relatively tiny town in the mountains of Northern Luzon in the Philippines. It’s big brother next door, Banaue is the one you hear more about around Manila, as Batad is a little harder to get to. That said, I tell you now if you make it all the way up to Banaue from Manila, and don’t go the little extra to see Batad… I will find you… and bad things will happen.

I’ll leave the “getting there” for another post and we’ll kick this off from when we got down the mountain trail into the entrance to the place they call Batad.

Batad is basically an enormous… valley… for lack of a better word, situated between 4 mountain peaks. The valley however is like a big dish, of which the sides are completely rice terraces!

If you don’t know what a rice terrace it, here goes. Basically hundreds of years ago, the farmers in this area were faced with a conundrum. They wanted to grow rice, but weren’t blessed with any nice flat land on which to do so. So what they did was to effectively build “stairs” into the side of mountains, each flat level of which represented kilometers of land where they could grow the rice they had to! What resulted was thousands of these little “stairs” that combine to make one of the most breathtaking mountainscapes you’re ever likely to see.

If my description didn’t do it for you, just check the pic below.

Anyway, so we come into Batad, pass by a small table of men who are collecting a little entry tax of some kind, while simultaneously spit roasting an enormous pig for lunch.

We walk down a steep set of stairs into the front door of our accommodation at “The Hillside Inn”. There’s not really a check in process, (after all there’s no electricity) so we throw our bags down and head for the old inn’s valley facing balcony.

The site we see is one I’ll never forget:

I felt such a feeling of peacefulness come over me that I didn’t want to do anything but sit on this balcony for the afternoon, sip some lemonade (there’s not many beverage options) and listen to the local owner strumming away on his guitar.

The afternoon winds down as you watch the sun gradually disappearing behind one of the grandiose mountains. Next it’s time for dinner.

The food there is nothing special, it’s only special because it’s all cooked there by the lovely family who run the inn. For the circumstances there’s actually a pretty decent sized menu. We enjoyed some simple fried rice with chicken which definitely hit the spot after the big hike we’d had through the hills to get to the renowned terraces.

The next day we woke up with some energy again and were ready to explore everything else Batad had to offer.

Before we proceed I should make you aware of what Batad and The Hillside Inn is so there’s no confusion.

This is a TINY mountain village. There are no cars, minimal electricity, the shower is a big barrel of cold water with a scoop, and the toilets flush by you pouring water into them manually.

If any of that bothers you, skip Batad. OR open your mind just a tiiiiny bit and allow yourself to experience it for what it is. If you do, I PROMISE you won’t regret it.

So, the first thing we decided to do for the day was to take a walk along the terraces. A young man from the inn offered to take us for a small tip.

The walk is a challenging one. You walk up and down mountain paths, across the edge of terraces, up stairs, through little farmers huts, and more.

The walk goes through the terraces and down to a nearby waterfall!

A word of warning. The walk takes about an hour but it’s PRETTY strenuous. Going down, particularly nearing the waterfall it gets into a pretty steep decline with these big steps that can be tricky to navigate. But that’s nothing compared to making the same walk BACK… we’ll get to that later.

When you come to the waterfall you’re sweaty and MORE than ready for a swim. It’s a magical site to see this when you come around the final curve…

You can easily kill a few hours here swimming around in falls as the current pushes you back to the shore, or sunning yourself on the rocks like a regular lizard.

There’s a whole little rocky river segment that you can explore down here too, hopping from one rock to the next and taking in that sweet misty waterfall air.

Finally the time came to leave and begin the trek back to the inn. I say trek this time because it’s pretty hectic. Poor Elysia was feeling it on the old legs, but I won’t pretend that I was fit enough to have taken it without a couple of groans either. Some of the steps down near the water fall are like half a meter high per step. You literally climb them rather than walking them.

At last it’s back to your room at the inn. You thank the guide (who basically RUNS the whole way without raising a sweat) and hit your room for a well deserved afternoon nap.

Overall we spent 2 days in Batad, and as we reflected back, this was about the perfect amount of time. We were able to see what we wanted to see there, relax long enough to take in the serenity of the place without becoming bored, and leave with only the fondest of memories.

In my opinion the Batad rice terraces simply defy explanation. It’s one of those things that you just have to see in order to appreciate their sheer size and grandeur, not to mention this epic feat of olden day farming innovation.

I recommend any trip to the Philippines include a stay at Batad, even if it’s just a couple of days like we did. The Hillside Inn is also definitely the place to stay. At $15 a night you can’t really go wrong, and people will say the nearby Simon’s Inn is better because it has a slightly bigger menu (and some pizza’s that we tried and thought were half decent) but the positioning of the Hillside Inn makes it the definite winner.

If you’re planning a trip to Batad, I envy you. Get ready for a special experience and enjoy the ride!

Author: Andrew Hansen