Sleepless in Sagada : Echo Valley

Thursday, July 16, 2015

The weather lately has made me think of Sagada more than my usual yearning to be nestled in a cold place while enjoying a cup of coffee and having my daily morning stick. I love the Summer weather but I hate how it makes you all sweaty and sticky. I think I'd prefer the cold weather any day which is why I chose to talk about Echo Valley for today! After traversing the Lumiang-Sumaguing Cave Connection, which would explain why I'm still wearing my rash guard underneath my hoodie, we went on with our journey to explore Echo Valley which is also where you can find the Hanging Coffins of Sagada. 

From the town proper, our guide dropped us off at the Church of Saint Mary the Virgin, which is an Episcopalian church famous for its rose-colored stained glass windows. After making our way inside the church and offering our own personal prayers, we went on with the tour. You'll pass by Echo Valley on your way to Hanging Coffins. The trek to Echo Valley takes about 10 minutes and another 5 minutes to the Hanging Coffins. Echo Valley was named as such simply because there's an echo whenever you produce a sound. A lot of tourists mistakenly thought it was Kiltepan and started channeling Angelica Panagiban in TTCT--expressing their woes on love as if the echo would make everything go away. More than the illusion of vanishing love woes, the view from Echo Valley was breath-taking. We stayed longer at that spot more than we did at the Hanging Coffins.

The Hanging Coffins felt a little eerie to me. According to our guide, the position of the coffin indicates how well-loved the person was. The higher the position of the coffin, the more valued the person was. Our guide also told us that only the ones who died of natural causes were allowed to be placed inside the hanging coffins. Tradition prohibits those who died as infants or those who died from illnesses to be placed in the hanging coffins as it was believed that they brought bad luck.  

Our trek to Echo Valley and The Hanging Coffins was one of the most enjoyable "strolls" I've had during our trip to Sagada. The trek wasn't tiring, we had good company and the weather was perfect. I would've preferred a shirt over my Rash guard and hoodie, though. But overall, it was awesome! I'm having a lovely long weekend because it's a holiday tomorrow, yay! Hope you get to have a lovely long weekend too. Cheers to the weekend! 🎉

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