PANDEY RICE TERRACES: A BAKUN CLUSTER TERRACES

 Location:  Barangay Bila, Bakun, Mountain Province

Overlooking Pandey Rice Terraces upon descending Mount Bato

When one searches in Google of rice terraces, it identifies two grouped major terrace clusters of the provinces of Ifugao and Mountain Province.  Meanwhile, it divides the Mountain Province terraces three major clusters, namely:  Maligcong, Bontoc and Sagada and Sabangan.  However, Bakun is not a part of the three aforementioned major terraces clusters.  Bakun is a different municipality from Bontoc.  It only mean that Google has not updated yet its major terrace clusters of the Mountain Province.

Descending Mount Bato with my guide (in the picture)

Visiting Pandey Rice Terraces was just a side trip after my 7 Peaks of Bauko climb with my guide, Tom Sudaypan, a native of Bakun.  This 7-peak climb was indeed very rewarding as the trail is dominantly grown with pine trees. Our exit to Pandey Rice Terraces was the Mount Bato, which completed my 7 Peaks of Bauko climb.  Mount Bato is a minor climb with an elevation of 1,872 MASL or 6,141.73 feet)

Clearing heading to Pandey Rice Terraces

Pandey Rice Terraces can be reached via local trekking paths and rustic stone steps from Barangay Bila often referred to by visitors as a steep "stairway to heaven" climb past local streams and traditional viewpoints.  This is just 650 meters away from my rustic accommodation in Iyaman Farm Resort .

The rice thresher against its backdrop of the slopes of Mount Bato

It was Tom, my guide idea, to head towards here in Pandey Rice Terraces instead of trekking directly to my accommodation in Iyaman Farm Resort.  It just happened that by the time we were here, it was harvest time for rice.

Harvesting rice using sickle or kumpay in local language

I got excited to join the rice harvesting when I saw the locals harvesting rice.  A local lend me a sickle to use for harvesting rice stalks.  Locally, this sickle is called kumpay which is used for cutting whole rice stalks, or a small finger-mounted blade --- often called a ani-ani knife, rakem, or lakem --- used to snip individual rice panicles by hand. A kumpay is a handheld, curved metal blade attached to a short wooden handle.  It is used to swing or slice through multiple rice stalks close to the base.

The lower part of Pandey Rice Terraces

From the point, where I harvested rice, we moved to the lower part of the terraces.  We happened to see a mountain resort near a rushing stream, but it was already abandoned.

The other part of the terraces

The other part of the rice terraces

This location is connected towards a non-concrete road enough for vehicles to pass since harvests are being transported to the town.  The average temperature in this location ranges from 19 degrees Celsius to 23 degrees Celsius year-round, reflecting the cool, high-elevation climate of the Cordillera mountain region.   The weather patterns here is prone to mist, cloudy skies, and frequent mountain showers or rain.

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