Our family loves to go out of town/country every summer and Christmas break. For the past two summers, we all had our own trips around the world especially the summer of 2012 so we were really thankful that we finally had the chance to go on vacation last December with everyone present.
Mommy, my lola, usually plans our trips and last December 2012, we went to Las Casas Filipinas de Azucar in Bataan. It’s a resort with a twist — all accommodations are heritage houses from around the Philippines and moved to the resort. It actually started as a collection of houses by the owner, which he eventually opened to the public. Some people might disagree that heritage houses should not be moved from its original place but most of the houses in the resort were bought and moved there because they were not taken care of. Since many of the houses are around a hundred years old, maintaining and restoring these houses become too expensive for the original owners so having the chance to be rebuilt and kept in good condition in the resort is a perfect way to preserve this, at the same time educating people about Philippine history and culture.
Before we went to the resort, we stopped by Mount Samat to check out Dambana ng Kagitingan. This shrine was created to honor the soldiers that died during WWII. Bataan holds an important place in Philippine history especially during that time because it was where American and Filipino soldiers retreated to from Manila. This was also the place where they surrendered to the Japanese and where they started the Death March to Tarlac.
I start this post with my youngest sibling, Lance!
The Hits and The Misses 