Taking the Ohayami Bus to Banaue

Taking the Ohayami Bus to Banaue
Experiencing the Rice Terraces
Tappiyah Falls and Banaue Museum

Banaue-Batad Itinerary
Banaue-Batad Expenses

It's been a long time since I last updated this blog and I'm ashamed to say I almost forgot about it. A friend of mine recently started a blog and made me remember mine. Lol.

Still, my adventures don't stop like my writing does, so let me share my trip to the Banaue and Batad Rice Terraces.

Now that's what I call green!

One thing I learned immediately while preparing for this trip was that most of the popular bus lines that traveled the Manila-Banaue route like Autobus and Florida were now forbidden to do so. They were never licensed to travel this route and in fact, only one bus line had a license. This was the Ohayami bus line. Before this trip, I had never even heard of this bus company.

But, in times like this, Google is my best friend and with hardly any effort, I was soon calling their office (09276491711 or 09058814361) and inquiring about bus schedules.

Now our planned date was the Independence Day long weekend, June 9-10. We saved 11-12 as rest days. Why June, you ask? Isn't that a rainy month? It is! But I read an article that in June, Banaue rice terraces are green while Batad rice terraces are golden in color. Well, I later disproved this because everything just looked green to me. Maybe in August, when it's harvest time, do the rice terraces truly turn gold.

Ohayami informed me that we had to personally go to their office to buy advanced tickets to secure our reservation. However, after checking their website (www.ohayamitrans.com) now, it appears they accept online reservations. It's still a good idea to personally buy the tickets, though, because you learn the best way to get to the terminal and don't waste time getting lost.

I do believe there are a few golden flecks here and there.

Ticket fares cost Php 450, one way from Manila to Banaue. We chose to take the 10 pm schedule on June 8 because we still had work during the day. Travel time was expected to be around 9 hours.

To get to the Ohayami bus terminal, the easiest way is to meet up at the Jollibee store directly below the Legarda LRT2 station.

The Jollibee store is right alongside Figueras street where a lot of tricycles wait for passengers. Ride one of these to Ohayami Trans. Fare is Php 10. Right before you reach the Florida bus terminal, the trike will turn right and go along Fajardo street. Ohayami buses are a bright violet so it should be easy to spot them.

This is Batad. The pictures prior to this are from Banaue.

We left at exactly 1 0pm. The bus was quite crowded with passengers even on the center aisle, making it hard to get out during stopovers. I felt bad for the people on the aisle since they always had to get up when people wanted to pass. Fortunately, the bus we took going home didn't have center seats.

We took longer than the estimated time because we arrived at 8 am in Banaue. See my next post for our activities that day.