Negros Trail Fever December 2013

Video: http://youtu.be/kDWf1h3wt4k
Trails Ridden: PNOC long and short, Campuestuhan Tube 1 and Campuestuhan Barbed Wire
It has been a year-ender tradition for my in-laws to visit Negros Occidental, and since 2011 its has become part of my tradition as well. When I first arrived at San Fernando, Talisay, what caught my attention were these awesomely huge mountains which looked quite magestic from where I was staying, and I just kept drooling over the thought of making trails on those mountains. Fast forward to Dec 2013 and I was finally able to arrange for my bike to be brought to Negros. I arrived at the port of San Carlos City at 6:00PM, took the Escalante route, where for the first time in my life I witnessed a field fire.
A good half hour into the drive, massive rain started to pour and made driving really difficult, with almost zero visibility due to the downpour, plus the lack of road reflectors and street lights. In addition to that, the road was all rock garden for a good 10-15 kilometers, and that's when I regretted not taking the Don Salvador route. The heavy rain didn't let up until at the exact moment we arrived at our destination (no exaggeration) and the supposed 2 hour drive became a 4 hour penance. That's how the rain trolls people.

The difficulties were well worth it, considering that Negros had so much to offer in many aspects. I could enumerate a lot of nice things about Negros, but I'll sum it up later in general points. During the entire course of my stay, I was able to do a long XC route on Day 1 On day 2, I was able to meet up with awesome riders: Francis, Jigs, Bai and Miks who were quite cool and brought me to their PNOC track .

It was far, as you can see on the map, but the DH track was exceptional. Although it would have been a lot better if the track wasn't so bloody muddy, with all the hilarious spills, it was fun nonetheless.
A day before I was scheduled to go back to Cebu, Francis, Dave, John, Bai and Marlon were kind enough to let me tag along on their Campuestuhan ride. We met at Alanginan's Richelle's Bike Ave, some kind of local diner(Carenderia), and comissioned 2 tricycles going to Campuestuhan, where midway we had a mishap as one of the tricycles broke a chain. So the pushing begins, which wasn't really all that bad since John entertained us with his singing. Too bad I wasn't able to catch the tube 1 part which was really high speed, didn't count on getting mud on the gopro.
There are a lot of fun things to do in Negros so one can unwind, and while I was there I did a lot of XC riding while visiting some old historic places. I was also able to bathe in the really cool river water and messed around with the local kids. They also have some nice beaches, nature resorts, great food and very nice people. All in all, I'm looking forward to another great adventure on the summer of 2014.Yeah that's me humping that lion statue.

Please do watch the vid by going to this link. Video: http://youtu.be/kDWf1h3wt4k I am still yet to upload it on Pinkbike.