SAGADA, Mt. Province, Philippines—Sagada attracts its fair share of tourists, but it remains a conservative town that tries to hide its rich heritage to control tourist arrivals.
This may soon change.
Last Jan. 29, Sagada mounted its first Etag Festival and the community of 3,600 households became more conscious of its role as a travel town.
Sagada receives 300,000 visitors each year, says Vice Mayor Richard Yodong, and last year, about 200 Europeans visited the town from July to September.
European trekkers and young college students make up Sagada’s repeat travelers, who can’t end a year without seeing Sagada’s caves, terraces that grow red rice and hanging coffins that have been the town’s symbols since the 1970s.
The town proper sees little of its guests during the day because many spend time inside the caves or up in the mountains, says Mary Carling, a Sagada resident.
She says they only turn up before the curfew starts at 9 p.m.
Aside from its natural attractions, Yodong says visitors also come to Sagada to enjoy the cool weather.
During the Etag festival, many of the 400 tourists were shivering at 10 a.m. because the temperature had dropped to 8 degrees Celsius.
Given all its attributes, it will be only a matter of time before more tourists make the trip up north. And to accommodate them, Yodong says the government plans to build a 50-room hotel.
The town also plans to put up convention halls and training centers because many visitors include professional groups looking for a quiet place to reflect.
The Department of Tourism lists about 100 available rooms that are leased out to visitors each year.
New inns have also sprouted around the small town, adding colorful names like Churya-a Inn and Rock Inn to the established St. Joseph’s Inn at the town center.
If the local government is unable to spend for a new hotel, Yodong says the town can tap financiers from outside Sagada to help raise the P30 million needed for the project.
“We want to talk to the residents here to accommodate tourists especially during peak season [which lasts from Christmas until Holy Week, much like the peak tourist season of Baguio City]. We experience an overflow of tourists and there are those who even get mad because they could not find a place to stay,” he says.
Not everyone, however, is upbeat about this growing Sagada trade.
Lope Bosaing, a local potter, cautions the local government against rushing into these programs without first addressing Sagada’s resource limitations.
He says officials “should consult the community regarding its grand plan to build more hotels [because Sagada] is still dealing with problems [like] water supply, accommodation and sanitation.”
He says the local government should be able to calculate how far it can open up the town without affecting the water supply of its residents.
Yodong says the local government is conscious of these concerns and it already has a solution: Harness a nearby river.
But Bosaing’s real concern is development itself. “Leave Sagada as it is. Sagada is a simple town. Its simplicity is its major attraction,” he says. With a report from EV Espiritu, Inquirer Northern Luzon
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