Our trip to Ifugao marked the Renegade Junctures completion of Northern Luzon provinces, and our trip to Sorsogon marked the completion not only of Southern Luzon but its entire mainland. That was the easy part. While Luzon is the largest of the main island groups of the Philippine archipelago, it was relatively a breeze for us to visit every mainland province since we would just have to drive through them. Completing the mainland Luzon provinces, however, meant that wherever we go in Luzon from that point onward would be a repeat visit, stalling our count to complete all the 82 provinces for #Project82PH. It is not as if we are complaining though or that we do not want to revisit places where we have previously been. Revisits are always welcome in Renegade Junctures especially if it is an attraction that we never got to visit the first time we were in a particular province. Besides, it is unavoidable to revisit a province in the Philippines specially since that no matter how long one stays in a place, a certain spot would certainly be left behind that could be reserved to be seen in the future.

As a tribute to how 2025 had been good for our traveling duo, we decided to end the year differently by doing a revisit to provinces where we had been before, but focusing on places that we have not yet seen.

Our wonderful 2025!

Our first stop: Apayao.

Apayao was our longest drive in 2023 when we had our own version of the northern loop. We stayed in the province for two nights before taking on the long and winding road through the provinces of Kalinga, Mountain Province and Benguet before taking the expressway back to Bulacan. For 2025, we took a different route and targeted to visit just a single destination in Apayao but the one that would give us a unique adventure, Mt. Kilang.

It was the fault of social media. Mt. Kilang had been trending recently, as its majestic stance could be seen from a view deck that is by the roadside. A mountain drive to see a breathtaking view without the usual grueling hike? Well that’s big! We had to see it!

We left Malolos City at 08:00 PM, knowing that while we would be taking on some roads we have already driven on before, the final stretch would be totally unfamiliar to us. 04:00 AM of the following day, we reached the Ilocos Norte boundary. 30 minutes more and we were battling the complete darkness of Pinili–Nueva Era Road in Pinili, Ilocos Norte.

After around an hour more and we finally reached a checkpoint along Ilocos Norte–Apayao Road in the town of Solsona, Ilocos Norte. We lowered our window for what we thought to be a routine checkpoint. When asked where we were headed to, we said Mt. Kilang, prompting the police officer to ask for our tourist registration receipt. Our bad, we missed that part that we had to register, let alone that we had to do so. We then had to turn around to proceed to the Solsona Tourism Information and Assistance Center in front of the Federico F. De Lara Civic Center, just within the vicinity of the municipal hall.

After registering and paying PHP 50.00 per head, we resumed our journey going to Mt. Kilang in the town of Calanasan, Apayao. The daybreak was upon us by then, and little by little, the beauty of the mountain range around us came to view. The fatigue of all night driving seemed to have gone with the darkness, taken away by the wonders surrounding us.

As we pushed on to our destination, we saw from afar that there seems to be a cloud build up ahead that was heavily covering the mountains. As we went on, we entered the thick mist. We had to tread on the road slowly as visibility was poor, as if we were figuring out our way through a maze of haze. Eventually, we reached the view deck in Barangay Butao in Calanasan, Apayao where there was a heavy mountain rain and we were in the middle of it.

We tried waiting out the rain while inside the car. An hour passed, however, and the downpour just had not stopped, though it has lightened up a little already. At that point, we decided to go out of the car and take photos under the drizzle anyway. We already spent an entire night traveling; we might as well take the most of what was in front of us.

The rain eventually stopped, but the surroundings remained covered in dense mountain clouds. That did not stop us, however, from pushing through. Not so far away from the Mt. Kilang Pass signage lies the real deal, the view deck overlooking Mt. Kilang itself. We had to be there.

We reached the view deck in a couple of minutes. Due to the heavy fogging, there was nothing to see there when we arrived.

It was already around 08:30 AM when we were at the view deck of Mt. Kilang. We returned to the car after taking our photos. After some discussion, we decided to give it until 10:00 AM and wait for the weather to clear up. We did not want out trip to end up in vain. It had been more than 12 hours already since we left home in Malolos City, Bulacan, hence we thought that a couple of hours more of wait would no longer hurt.

Our car was surrounded by thick, dense clouds when Ran and I decided to catch some sleep. It was a tiring sleepless night after all, and there could be no better experience than to sleep in cold weather as we waited out for the mountain clouds to clear up. I even set the alarm on my cellphone, lest we sleep in.

Come 10:00 AM, my cellphone started alarming like crazy. I woke up, looked around, and realized that it was still drizzling outside. The weather had somehow improved but still not enough to give a clear view of our surroundings. In my mind, that was it; it was an epic fail. We would not see Mt. Kilang, the mountain that social media had been going crazy about. A sense of frustration had started to kick inside my head.

At around 10:15, I nudged Ran to wake up, but he asked for 15 minutes more. Somehow exasperated, I told him that 15 minutes would no longer make a difference. No argument ensued though. He had returned back to sleep.

15 minutes more. Seriously? How much difference could 15 minutes make?

As it would turn out, a lot.