Suffering in Subic

For the longest time I've been dreaming of biking in Subic. I would imagine how awesome it would be like to be riding in its jungles and discover trails networks that haven't seen any mountain bikers before.

Last Sunday I finally did it. And this time I was with King and Topher.

Yes, you read that right - Topher - my kumpare from Batangas City joined us in this trip. He left at 4:00 a.m. and was already at the EDSA Pioneer area at around 5:00 a.m.

After picking up King from his place, we had breakfast at Burger King in NLEX and drove to Subic.

It was almost 9:00 a.m. when we got there. We parked the car near the golf driving range, geared up and pedaled out.

From the asphalted road going to Binictican, we turned left to a dusty road that went up and up and up. It went like that for about three and a half kilometers before it rewarded us with some fast downhills.

Usually I would blast down these things, but Subic's trail is different - there's sand and loose soil, which makes it a risk for me. It was like Maarat's Boy/Girl trail during summer. So rather than ripping it, there were sections when I actually walked the bike to be sure.

The next major climb was going to the peak. I tried to pedal it but it was just too steep and too rutted for me. So I did what I was born to do - push my bike up.

The view at the top was awesome. Despite the blaring sun, it was still cool because of the strong winds. Sadly, these hills are also victims of deforestation.

We went down at the other side, and the trail here was more rutted. We were very careful not to lose traction, else it would be a long walk back to civilization.

It was actually the ride back to Subic that killed me. We ended up at the old highway, which was technically in Bataan already. And because we were riding bikes, we're not allowed to take the usual expressway back to the golf course. We had to do two major climbs under the hot sun to get to Olongapo and enter there.

I was cramping already at the middle of the second climb. It wasn't steep or long, but because I didn't expect it, I wasn't mentally prepared for it.

We went straight to Mini Stop as soon as we entered Subic. The boys had ice cream while I had Gatorade and a kariman. I was almost running on empty that I can hardly keep up with the two on the ride back to the parking area.

We got back to our car at around 2:30 in the afternoon. After changing, we headed to the Xtremely Xpresso and rewarded ourselves with a humongous Big Ben pizza.

Subic really did deliver. And this is just one of them. I'm sure there are more.

Check out below the map of our ride. As usual, try to open it with Google Earth as Bing's map sucks.