Igorot finds worthwhile venture in Lakbay Norte tour

Young and personable entrepreneur Mac Baldos is from northern Philippines.

He spent his growing up years in Benguet, Mt. Province and Baguio City amid ecological wonders like the Rice Terraces in Banaue and Batad and the caves of Sagada, that cool, captivating mountain town that has attracted adventurous tourists, domestic and foreign.

TOURISTS marvel at Ifugao’s rice terraces

Like Hemingway’s Paris, the beauty of the Cordillera mountain ranges is a moveable feast for Baldos; he carries it with him wherever he goes.

His mother Estella is a full-blooded member of the indigenous Kankana-ey ethno-linguistic group. His father Fernando, on the other hand, is from Ilocos Sur.

They met at the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) in Baguio, where Fernando, who was with the military police, was stationed.

Baldos later took up business management at Letran College in Intramuros, Manila, and applied what he learned in various jobs. For six years, he was involved in insurance, but the scenes of his childhood and early youth never left him and so, backed by his parents and two siblings, he decided to make a venture out of these rich experiences.

In Sept. 2014, the Baldos family established a travel agency with the registered name Ethan-Keon—after Baldos’ nephew and son, respectively, but better known as DC Travel.

“We are the owners as well as the employees,” said Baldos, “It’s like everything evolved around us.”

DC Travel’s Lakbay Norte project focused on journeys to well-known destinations in the North, the places where the family grew up or visited frequently.

Lakbay Norte was marketed through Tao Philippines online and eventually, the program won clients through word of mouth and recommendations from enthusiastic foreigners.

The parents shelled out about P200,000 to put up the company. Baldos is head of operations and lead guide during the trips, which begin in Manila and take four days and three nights. The main activities are trekking and caving. The destinations covered are Banaue and Batad, with its amphitheater-like terraces, Sagada, Baguio and, on the way back, Mt. Pinatubo, which continues to fascinate foreigners because of the cataclysmic eruption during the early 1990s.

The vehicles used are a company 4-by-4 and a hired jeepney for the bumpy mountain roads, with the foreigners enjoying the view while riding atop the vehicle.

Baldos makes it a point to hire a local guide in Batad, where there are many guides who consider themselves lucky if they get hired once a week.

TREKKING in Banaue, Ifugao

“This will provide food for their families,” said Baldos.

Americans are joining the tours this year, while from October to December last year, the trekkers were all Europeans: Germans, Dutch, French, Greeks and Czechs.

The Baldos family’s investments appear to be paying off.

From October to the end of 2014, there were eight trips made. And more will follow this year.

“We’re starting to grow,” Baldos said.

“Tourism is growing in the Philippines and that’s the reason we started this project,” he explained. “And the government is assisting [in the tourist trade]; they are more helpful.”

But more than the income, Baldos said he gets fulfillment from being able to share his culture with the tourists from here and abroad. It is also his way of paying tribute to his roots.

“Igorot culture is rich, and I am part Igorot. Seeing the beauty of the Cordillera is very uplifting, very inspiring. And as a young entrepreneur, I want to share this with other people, especially foreigners who are not familiar with it, who don’t have something like this back home,” he said.