Not Such a Good Fellow
While I was in the process of organizing my friend Larry's Mindanao trip (see my last post ), I ran into a major issue: if you're coming to Mindanao for birding, there are a number of species that can really only be seen at very, very high elevation. For most birders, this means a visit to either Mount Apo, Mount Dulang-Dulang, or Mount Kitanglad, three massive volcanic peaks that make up the spine of central Mindanao. The problem was that as of August every single trail that could get us to these altitudes was closed for hiking. In the case of Mounts Dulang-Dulang and Kitanglad, all high-elevation trails were off-limits to non-residents of that particular region. Mount Apo, meanwhile, was closed for environmental rehabilitation, which is a much more sensible policy, but was personally quite inconvenient. I had just about given up when I happened to message my birding friend Julius , who had joined me on my first visit to the new Lake Holon trail in July. Julius is the touri...