https://lakwatsero.wordpress.com was the original home of The Lakwatsero Travel Blog. This was started in 2009 and now the blog has grown up.

To maximize the power of WordPress I have decided to run this on a self hosted site.

To continue following my adventures, please visit:
http://lakwatsero.me

My trip to Taal Volcano on December 29, 2008 was THE trip that gave birth to The Lakwatsero and my many adventures that were to follow.

For this weekend, my original plan was to go to Donsol which became a Skydiving adventure… which also didn’t push through. So on Friday I decided to go back to Taal Volcano. Why go back? A few nights earlier I saw a travel show on TV (I don’t recall the show or the channel so don’t ask). In the feature the female host talked about being able to cook an egg while in the crater of Taal.

The show made me recall that during the first trip, I remember seeing down to people who went to the water in the crater. I remember asking our guide who said that it was possible. What he didn’t quite explain was how and where to go. Anyway… it was decided… BACK TO TAAL I go!

What was to follow was a different experience from the first, and I was very happy with this Lakwatsa.

On my way back to the Bart station after roaming the streets of San Francisco, I was a little hungry. I wanted to drop by McDonald’s (yes… McDo) for their Mushroom and Swiss Angus Burgers when I remembered… Blondie’s Pizza!

Blondie’s is my favorite Pizza in the entire world. It’s flavorful and oozing with… oil! YUM! I know there are a few branches, but the only one I have ever been to is the one Powell street, right next to the Cable Car turnstile and the huge Gap store.

Aaah.

My last two trips to Blondie’s years back has been somewhat traumatic… hehe. When you are there around lunch time, it is full and the people behind the counter are very impatient… ala Sienfeld’s Soup Nazi. They pressure you into spurting out an order immediately. At around 3pm… things were a little slow. Whew!

With all the different “flavors” I chose a plain Pepperoni Pizza. I actually didn’t like pepperoni before… until I had my first one at Blondie’s.

I went down to the someone dim-lit dinning area enjoyed my slice of pizza. I should have ordered 2 slices.

I had a meeting in downtown San Francisco. The meeting was set at 2:30pm but I arrived via BART at around 12:30 so I had time to walk around. San Francisco is my favorite US City. Full of life and color. Here are a few scenes from my little walk…

The Ferry Building

High tech self-cleaning street toilet

 

sculpture/fountain…

Bike messengers resting under a scultpure

 

And of course, ang walang kamatayang Cable Car

I had made the Mt. Pinatubo Trek twice last year. The first was on January 3, 2009 with Jasper and Dru, then the following month on February 8, 2009 with Binggoy, Bong. Chris, and RJ. Also in Pampanga, I tried the ultra-lite plane ride around Mt. Arayat at the Angeles City Flying Club on April 25, 2009.

This time, I combined the two and took the Mount Pinatubo Sky Tour through Omni Aviation (http://omniaviation.com/). I first heard about this through Ivan Henares when he blogged about it last year. Omni Aviation is actually owned by my cousin, Ben Hur Gomez, but I didn’t want to use that info when I called to make a reservation (nahiya ako) so I paid the full amount.

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