THERE’S a great new place for fathers to bond with their families today as the world celebrates Father’s Day. In fact , the new place could be a prefect venue for a date with the family all year round. The place, aptly called the Green Recreational Eco-Adventure Tourism (GREAT) offered at the Dagook Adventure Tourism Excitement (DATE) is presented as another wholesome family treat for parents to introduce their kids to nature conservation and environment protection concepts. Catigbian Mayor Roberto Salinas said DATE was another interesting offer to the Abatan River Community Life Tours and orients a family to the sublime concepts of nature conservation through recreational adventure that is safe, exhilarating and totally fun. The mayor who has been credited to the leaps and bounds the town has shown in the past six years admitted that it took them that long to tweak with the local economy to keep it humming before feeing comfortable at looking at other concern: starting off into a veritable tourism enterprise. We are offering this to the Catigbianons, who are celebrating their 62 nd Foundation Anniversary, the mayor said during the blessing and launching. We just would want to make better opportunities for Catigbian, he added.

DATE is a recreational park set in a 203,000 square meters of contiguous land in Barangays Poblacion Weste and Rizal, two villages which are separated by the Sampilangon River, explained municipal engineer Russel Lungay in her project briefing before a sizable crowd including Department of Tourism representative of the regional director. It can be recalled that Catigbian is the town too far from the navigable portions of the Abatan River, where river tours have been started since 2010. Opened to decongest Loboc River and present an entirely different come-on in community life immersions at the communities sharing the river resource, the Abatan tours often stop before the tourists could get to Catigbian. Upon the suggestion of Abatan Australian consultants David and Fiona Aaron, Salinas and the Catigbian Performance Team teamed with Danao consultants to offer a tour experience that gets tourists a true taste of immersing in the wilds, complete with Catigbian segment. DATE park offers a thorough recreational and educational experience in its four major thrills interspaced with guided spiels on the medicinal plants, shrubs, trees, vines, ferns, springs and brooks, rivers and waterfalls and cascades, caves, macaques, common birds as one passes through the trails. One however needs to gear up for the experience. At the main center, one can get assistance to get you into a Petzl headgear, safety harness, outsized hooks and a slider roller for the later mountain slide experience.

CANOPY WALK

Jiggling your way with the guide to the access ramp to the park’s first outdoor like experience, you would be treated to an educational tour of local herbal plant stash. The medicinal plants walk gets you a glimpse of how locals create paracetamols and stomach pain relievers from plants. The park’s major thrills include a 60 meter canopy walk suspended over some 20 meters of seven high tension steel cables lashed against each other to contribute to a staggering load capacity than can easily accommodate 60 persons at a person per meter ratio, assures Engr. Lungay. Like all suspended cable bridges, this one sways and undulates as one traverses the wood-planked bridge. The fear however is easily dissipated with the presence of Philippine macaques keenly observing you. From a high vantage point, one can be introduced to a new way of viewing things: that from a higher perspective. Trees with boles reaching a diameter of a foot more, some of them still with wild orchids, coconut groves, thick ferns and lush vegetation below makes one imagine how Tarzan could have seen wildlife from above.

TRAILS

From the Canopy walk, one follows a trail carefully carved out from an old trail which people used to access the roaring Dagook Falls some 20 meters below. The trail down however is not for the weak hearted. One part is only passable through a rickety wooden stair that truly makes you doubt if the decision to get as close to the fabled Dagook Falls to feel the adrenalin pump is really worth the effort. It is. And like they said, only those who persevere reaps the rewards of being engulfed in the thin mist of the falls roaring by hurling a ton of water per minute into a gorge. The lip of the falls can also be accessible from here, but one has to be extra cautious, a slip might be painful in this mossy dried riverbed. Looking up, the mist may at a time obscure the suspended cables where an occasional tourist maneuvers across the Monkey Bridge.

MONKEY BRIDGE

Known for the Philippine macaques that are occasionally spotted in the area, a suspended span of cables called the Monkey Bridge is another offer. The bridge that can only be traversed by doing a tightrope maneuver, but not quite. The 45 meter bridge is a combination of four cables, one of which is where your safety harness: your lifeline is attached, in case one’s shaking knees betray ones stern face. A main cable is strung to two more cables which act as an adventurist’s handrail, all three lashed at equal distances to minimize the sag and the sway. And oh, yes, the bridge is suspended some 30 meters where the roaring Dagook falls hurl a gurgling mass of water into the gorges below. A feat, although not yet as recommended for the faint-hearted is a brief stop in the middle of the shaking bridge to take a spectacular shot at the mists rising from the falls dropping tons of water below.

MOUNTAIN TRAILS

Following the monkey bridge is an ascending trail about 140 meters long which would peak at the next attraction. But, before that, the guide would then tell you about the importance of following established trails, a clear attempt to keep the nearby vegetation as pristine. The spiel is a standard instruction among all environmental trail guides, swaying away from established trails most likely creates impacts to the environment or to the wildlife within the area. The trail gets you through stone steps carved out from moss covered limestones. Here, vegetation mostly of secondary growth forests are still in its top condition that the trees and vines from a canopy of shades making the ascent relatively easy.

MOUNTAIN SLIDE

The peak of the trail leads to the mountain slide, a mini zipline spanning some 200 meters that gets you across the Dagook Falls and gets you a spectacular view of the surrounding mountains, Abatan River headwaters, and gives you the perspective you would not be getting from any other experience in the park. The slide starts from a platform installed on top of a cliff overlooking the river and lets the adventurer glide back to the main village center which ends the adventure tour. Although the slide pales in length compared to the one offered in Danao, Catigbian’s DATE park zipline produces the same exhilarating experience with the 200 distance traversed in about 20 seconds. It means, you’ll get exactly the same speed, same fear and the same thrill in a third of the time you would have to savor when you’re in the Danao Suislide. DATE park adventure offers a packaged tour for P700 per head inclusive of guides, use of equipment and park amenities including restrooms, trails access and the five experiences. DATE park is in Poblacion Weste, Catigbian, Bohol and is accessible by transport of on foot from the corner of FCB Catigbian. (Rey Anthony Chiu)