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CONQUERING THE CORDILLERA OF THE SOUTH 

Cutting ribbons, whether to usher in a new business, a new office or a building, can be a boring activity. 

But for a select group of mountaineers, it will be an entirely new experience this year. Their annual climb this summer will mark the debut of Mount Candalaga in Maragusan in the list of the country's most famous and challenging mountains. 

A ribbon-cutting ceremony will mark the start of a three-day affair of river crossings and sightseeing tours of waterfalls-more waterfalls than any other mountain scaled in the past 18 years. 

Mount Candalaga is the newest addition but the greener alternative to the brown, balding forests of the other mountains. 

And many are waiting for April 28; the beginning of the climb (it will end on May 3) says Roger Layson, the technical director for Southern Mindanao of the Department of Tourism. 

Organizers from the host Sandawa Apo Mountaineering and Ecology Club have selected 408 mountain climbers from 63 clubs across the country to scale the mountain, found in the interior municipality of Maragusan, Davao del Norte. 

Alan Boncato, adviser of the host club and the overall coordinator of the climb says, the mountain offers more river crossings than any of the other mountains in the range.  "There are 80 percent more river crossings in the trek on Mount Candalaga," he says. 

Candalaga is actually part of the Pacific-Cordillera range, whose peak reaches 7,880 feet.  The mountain range connects to the Ugor and Leonard mountain ranges in the northeast and the 9,780-foot Tagub in the southeast. 

It was only in June last year that Apo Sandawa hikers officially kicked off the scaling of the mountain to chart its trails to be made suitable for a national climb. 

The trailblazing includes clearing trails and installing permanent ropes to aid in the future climbs.  Follow-up climbs were also undertaken in the succeeding months to prepare the mountain for this year's climb. 

"Right at those trailblazing climbs, mountaineers have already vouches for Mount Candalaga's superior attraction with several waterfalls along the way, clean rivers and panoramic views." Boncato says. 

The more famous of these waterfalls are Marangig Falls, with about 13 series of falls, the Tagbibinta Falls, with nine and P'yalita Falls, with two.  On the first day of the climb, mountaineers pass by Marangig Falls and 17 other falls-many hidden-hot springs and a flurry of flowers and wildlife.  They will pitch camp at the slope of Mount Candalaga, where the Maragusan Valley spreads like a carefully laid-out blanket. 

On the second day, they will "conquer" the peak after passing Tagbibinta Falls, and weathering the biting cold that plunges to as low as 10 C.  On the third day is the downward trek to P'yalitan Falls and negotiating steep trail carved from a deep ravine starts.  A total of seven falls will be passed by. 

The mountain, however, has been scaled several times by local hikers but it would take this year's climb to put the Maragusan Mountain into the tourism and hobby map of the Philippines.  It will be the first of the two official climbs the Mountaineering Federation of the Philippines, Inc. will undertake this year.  The second, called the "midyear climb," will be conducted in October on another mountain elsewhere. 

Last year's national climb was held in Mindoro. 

Layson say's Mount Candalaga is likely to open opportunities to Maragusan, a town of 39,980 people.  The activity has been coordinated with the town mayor, Manolo Yanong. 

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