GQNPC Road Trip Leg 3: Strawberry fields are forever...

-
July 18, 2010.

La Trinidad, here we come!!

The morning drizzle did not dampen our moods about going to the strawberry farm. Alas, we arrived six weeks too late! Strawberry season was over for this year, and all we saw were the seedlings and the land preparation for next season... plus a scattering of vegetables, of course. 

So, instead of picking strawberries, I ended up buying 1kg at P250 from one of the vendors near the souvenir shops. Expensive, yes, but I don't go to Baguio that often. 

Anna has since eaten most of these strawberries and has converted the leftovers into strawberry cream popsicles. 

If strawberries were off season, strawberry-flavoured taho was not. I tried it out when Fe bought at Mines View Park and I decided that I preferred the traditional taho. Kuya Teodie's kids looked like they enjoyed the strawberry taho.

Then there were these huge Sagada navel oranges. I love citrus fruits, so I just had to try them. So sweet! Plus, their rinds weren't oily at all. I'm not sure if these oranges were in season, but I bought six anyway, at P100 per 3 pieces (and the vendor gave me an extra orange for free). Now, after eating one orange a day, I notice that my fruit supply is quickly running low and I need to stock up... (what's next, pomelo?) I hope that there are Sagada oranges in the supermarkets!

Cashew nuts were on sale too... and I thought they only sell these nuts in Antipolo. I was fighting off boredom by people-watching through the coaster's window when this man came by selling cashews. Now these nuts were the expensive ones (at P50 for a few ounces). I bought some anyway because Anna loves cashew nuts. 

The others... they were serious shopaholics!! They bought lots of vegetables near the strawberry farm, no longer intent on going to the Baguio City market. 

Just when I thought shopping was over (I was itching to get to Tam-awan Village), we stopped at the Coop, where there's a huge statue of a strawberry! Why it's there, I don't know. I'd expect it to be stationed somewhere near the municipal plaza, just like San Pablo's coconut and Calauan's pineapple.... or somewhere along the highway, just like Victoria's ducks.

Looks like Kuya Dennis liked this giant strawberry!

Comments

Post a Comment

Thank you for dropping by!

Before moving on, please share your thoughts or comments about the post. :)

Thanks again!

Popular posts from this blog

Skyflakes

-
One of the more famous Philippine exports is Skyflakes , a wheat-based, salty cracker. It is one of my emergency food items: I typically have some stocked at home and in my handbag in case I become hungry (like in traffic jams). When there's no electricity and it's impractical to cook rice (because the leftover would spoil), I'd open a pack of Skyflakes and generously coat each cracker with Cheez Whiz... if I had a bottle of it within reach. Anyway, each time I spent more than two weeks outside the Philippines, I'd be elated to see boxes of Skyflakes inside Asian stores (particularly when in I was Australia and in the USA). Back then, I took it as a sign of homesickness. When I moved to California, I didn't miss Skyflakes because Mommy made sure that there's a steady supply in the house. Skyflakes is embedded in Filipino gastronomy as a snack, a panawid-gutom , that anyone who reacts positively upon seeing Skyflakes outside the Philippines must have spe...
Read more

10 things I learned while driving on Marcos Highway to Baguio City

-
I went on a day trip to the City of Pines, which was around a 700-km drive from my house. I drove  going up there and then from the city to Victoria, Tarlac. After that, my dad took over the driving duties. It was day trip with Tita Ising and Tito Sibing with us. Anyway, this trip was my first time to go to Baguio City with me behind the wheel. As everyone who drives up knows, there are three main routes to Baguio from the lowlands: Kennon Road, which ascends from Rosario, La Union. It was out of my options because it's too dangerous to use that road in the rainy season. The second route is via Naguilian Road, which makes my trip a lot longer because the beginning of the ascent is in Bauang, La Union (further north). The last route, and the one I took, was the Marcos Highway, now known as the Aspiras-Palispis Highway. This 47-km road starts from Agoo, La Union and is touted as the safest route among the three.  As I drove up and then down (on the same day; we were in...
Read more

Surat Mangyan

-
Image
In high school, part of the Filipino curriculum was learning about one of the country's ancient native scripts called Baybayin . I learned back then that this script was eventually abandoned because the Spanish, and eventually the Americans, encouraged the use of the Latin script for written communications. But that's in the lowlands; the rules were different up in the mountains. In the lush mountains of Mindoro, groups of indigenous people called Mangyans  live largely in isolation away from the Christianised Filipinos. This isolation has led to the continuous development of the Mangyans' old script, Surat Mangyan . As I walked inside the Ayala Museum , I saw this bamboo tube (I'm not sure if it's an instrument) with Mangyan script written all over it. I suppose that this was equivalent to a book or a song. But I haven't figured out what's written yet, despite the translation guide provided. What I can do, however, is write my name in Ma...
Read more