March 25,

Once we were up and about, we had our Javas and breakfast of sourdough French toast. Yummy!😋  As we finished and cleaned up, we decided to head out. The same clouds or fog rolled over, but we went on out anyway.

We walked to the Baguio Museum, arriving around 1100. It cost 100 PHP ($1.73). It was a decent sized museum for so low a price, four levels. Inside the museum we learned about a few of the indigenous peoples of the Philippines. There are way more groups than the museum went into, as it concentrated on this local mountainous part of Luzon Island that Baguio is in. The museum had displays of the dress, some tools, jewelry, etc. of these tribes. There were also models of differing huts the various tribes built. Also some festivals of these groups were depicted. There was even a mummy on display, as some of the tribes practiced this upon death.

The museum touched on the mining that was a big part of the history of this island, dating from Pre-Spanish Colonization. The main mining was and still is gold. According to a placard. Also placards related the building of the city of Baguio in the very early 1900’s. Most of the designers, founders were American, and Baguio was started as a Colonial Hill-station. It has gone from hill-station, health resort to now the City of Pines. There were models of the early plans of the city, and the later city development from 2009. The Burnham park was a big part from the beginning stages and has mostly remained. The museum then went into WWII. Interesting, Japan invaded Baguio December 8,1941 – the day after it bombed Pearl Harbor. Then the museum touched on the 1990 earthquake. It was the biggest and deadliest as of 1990 in Philippine history hitting Baguio city hardest. It measured 7.9 magnitude, killed 1,621 people and caused 15 billion PHP in damages! I don’t know how this extrapolates today in US Dollars, but it would be significant. The death toll though… well, that’s tougher! There was also an art display of locals painters, great wood carvings, and some fun large cut outs you could put your face into. That was a feel good way to end the museum.

We left around 1220 and walked to the SM Mall. We were looking for rechargeable batteries and found them, but they were pricey. Jeff thought he could get them online cheaper. So we left the mall and were going to lunch, when we came upon a Cathedral we seen a lot. It sits high on a prominent spot on a hill in the city. We went on up to it, passing by statues of St. Peter, St. Paul and a Crucified Christ with two women standing and gazing at Him. The Cathedral is called Baguio Cathedral of Our Lady of Atonement, whew! When we arrived, it was close to the end of mass. So we waited and then went inside. It was not as big as we thought, but by no means small. The feeling was airy and was painted white with stained glass windows all around. The main altar was marble – white with gold trim’ and the other end of the hall had an organ. We sat and took it in for a bit. When we left, we exited by a side door and there was a sign of their schedule – M-F mass was given five times; Sat. was four times; and Sunday… well, there were ten English Mass services, two Ilocano services, and one Filipino Mass service. That is a bunch of services!!! We walked down off the hill passing a statue of St. Joseph holding an infant Christ.

We did navigate to get lunch, at Burnham Park. We stopped at the Vinceford Shawarma, Turkish Roasted Beef stall. We both had a Shawarma with cheese – Jeff had all meat and I had some veggies in mine. We shared an Ube Macapuno juice, which is a purple Yam (Ube) and sweet Coconut (Macapuno). We were both underwhelmed with the shawarma and don’t need to get the Ube Macapuno juice again. Sometimes food is just fuel, this was such a time.😐  Our “fuel” cost us 230 PHP, which is ($3.98). We ate there at the park, and then walked back to our place.

Afternoon became evening… We watched a color display in the eastern sky of sunset. That was cool. This phenomena is called anti-crepuscular rays or anti-solar rays.🤔  (I googled that info🤭)  Supper was Greek salad, and some homemade potato chips we had bought in the park. Great day of learning some about Baguio, Philippines!