Tagaytay and Taal Volcano

For the weekend, Mercedes was in Manila to celebrate her 74th birthday; on Sunday, she invited our little group to her sister’s house in Tagaytay. She had arranged for a van pickup and a home-cooked traditional Filipino Sunday lunch. Tagaytay is a resort town for Manilenos (which needs a tilde) – high on a ridge, it’s cool. People have summer homes there or just go down for the day or the weekend.

Mercedes is delightful – I’d like to have her spirit and her energy when I grow up! – and it was wonderful to see her. Her sister is also very nice, and some other family members were there, as were some of her high school friends – friends for 60 years! Mary couldn’t make it because it was a critical time for her project, but the rest of us were there. We took a walk around the subdivision, looking at the different houses and the flora – pineapple, guava, coffee growing (some fauna too, later – Asian cows).

Lunch was beef with rice, spaghetti with meat sauce, an egg dish that may not be traditional but for which I want the recipe, a potato salad and another similar salad, sweet potatoes and green beans and fried bananas – and for dessert, a cake made with sticky rice and brown sugar, a cake made with corn and coconut milk, and homemade ice cream in avocado, cheese, and ube (a kind of sweet potato) flavors (I didn’t eat everything I have listed, but am just relating what was there!). I bounced among various groups of conversation and then just relaxed while others cleaned up (something I don’t usually do – I liked relaxing!). Everyone left to go back to Manila except for the Manila PCRVs – taking advantage of the holiday weekend, we stayed over!

We took a walk – nice to be in the country – and had a drink at a place on the non-valley side of the ridge, overlooking Taal Lake and Taal Volcano. The lake is in a giant caldera, and there are over 40 cinder cones and other volcano formations that are islands in the lake. It’s a beautiful setting. We then lucked out with the first restaurant we tried – I had some fantastic pumpkin soup.

We got up early the next morning and took a tricycle down to Talisay, a lakeside resort town. From there we took a boat across the lake and hiked up the volcano; there are several hikes in the area, but we took the main route, a 45-minute easy climb. Most of the other visitors were riding horses up, but we walked. And inside the crater was another lake, and inside the lake was another little volcanic island. So there was a lake inside the crater inside the volcano inside the caldera on an island in an ocean….

When we returned to the resort of our boat hire, the proprietress (who is married to a Dutchman) had prepared lunch for us – Lake Taal tilapia, rice and vegetables. It was delicious. We got back to Manila in time for a book signing by the founder of their partner agency, and then went to another Makati watering hole. It was a great weekend!