Mount Pinatubo is a volcanic island situated in the Luzon island of Philippines. The mountain is famous for the eruption in 1991 which led to death of lot of people in the region. I booked the tour from Filipinotravel.com. They have group tours from manila and Clark. The tour was divided into three parts first part was transport to St Juliana station for registration. After the registration you will ride for around 1 hour in a 4X4 and the last part was 7 km hike to the crater lake.
The tour starts around 7 am from the registration station and the registration closes at around 6.30. You have to leave around 2.30 am if you are coming from manila and you have to leave at 5 am if you are coming for Clark. It also takes 3 hours more for your return journey from station Juliana to Manila. It is advisable to do the tour from Clark. Our guide picked up from my hotel around 5 am. It was around 1 hour ride from Clark in order to reach the registration place for the Pinatubo tour. We had to fill a basic registration form before starting our tour. You need to carry minimum 2 lit water ad some food for the tour.
The ride with the 4X4 lasted about 2-hour. The 4×4 was travelling on small streams, muddy terrain and grassland. Condition of the terrain was terrible and at some point I felt like the entire vehicle might fall apart. We finally reached the starting point of our trek around 9 am. It was a long 2 hours hike to the crater lake. The terrain was primarily rocky terrain with lots of gravel along the way. I will strongly advise to wear proper shoes for the hike. We crossed lots of small streams on our way to the crater lake. The trail mostly closed during the rainy season because the water level rises rapidly on the small streams. There has been lot of deaths along the trail in the past because of rapid flooding during rainy season.
Finally, we reached the final part of the hike. The last 1 km of the hike was very steep and slippery. We were amazed by the view of the crater lake. The lake was blue in color and it was surrounded by volcanic mountain. Swimming inside the lake is prohibited by local authority. I recommend people to carry their own lunch because there was no restaurant available at the place. After having lunch, we went down close to the crater lake. It was a different view compared to the view from the top but it was a steep walk back to the initial point. We started our return journey around 2 pm. It started raining heavily during our return journey. The water level started rising rapidly during our return trip. We crossed a lot of small streams with ease during the initial hike but during the return hike the flow of the water level was high. This trail should be definitely avoided during the rainy season. We finally reached the 4×4 pick up point around 4 pm. The return ride was lot worse because most of the small stream had turned into bigger streams with heavy flow of water. Our 4×4 was constantly hitting rocks and it was impossible to spot the rocks because of the flow of water.Finally, after a long 2 hours very bumpy ride we reached our initial base station. It was a well organized tour and our guide was very friendly.
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