Why I jumped off a cliff

One of the more memorable adventures I had as an editor of a domestic travel magazine was going on a river trek in Mapawa Nature Park in Cagayan de Oro. Here’s how I began the story…

“By the time I reached the edge of the cliff, I was tired, hungry, and thirsty. Beyond the rocky cliff by the lake was a lunch of inihaw na liempo, adobong manok, and cold bottles of water. From where I stood, 25 feet above the lake, I could see the veritable feast laid out in banana leaves. The only way I was going to get a drink of water was to leap into the air and let gravity take its course. For a forty-something person who is not so very fond of heights, it was a wildly frightening thought.”

When a photo from this trip popped out in Facebook Memories, I immediately took note of it, as a destination to be revisited. It was a disappointment then to learn that Mapawa Nature Park has ceased operations since August 1, 2020.

While it has become one of the leading eco-tourism destinations in Mindanao since my canyoneering adventure, the pandemic has made its operations as a commercial enterprise untenable. My heart breaks.

Tourism-oriented establishments ceasing operations has unfortunately become part and parcel of pandemic PH. In May 2020, PwC Philippines, together with the Department of Tourism, surveyed 247 decision makers across the different subsectors, 70 percent of whom belonged to tourism services and accommodations.

Some seventy-eight percent of tourism-related businesses have opted to temporarily stop offering their products/services during the ECQ, either due to restrictions or low demand. Majority of them, 88 percent, expect losses of over 50% of their 2020 revenues. More than half of them, 63 percent, expect their businesses to normalize within six months to over a year.

The survey was taken last May 2020 though, when we were that the government can manage the public health crisis. It is September, and we’re still on lockdown with quarantine guidelines forever shifting like the grains of dolomite sand in Manila Bay. Not good for business.

As we wait for the mirage of a vaccine, sometime in the second quarter of next year, we could only pray that there are enough enterprises like Mapawa Nature Park still standing, waiting for adrenaline junkies to go jumping again.

I will miss you, Mapawa.

Here’s my parting shot, from so many years ago…

“A river trek would not be complete without its share of gliding down water slides and jumping off cliffs, which I actually managed to do—surprisingly. I just channeled my inner Angelina Jolie, the one in the Tomb Raider movie, not the red carpet, and kicked the ass off those challenges. I slithered down a 20-feet water slide, wrecking my favorite pair of denim shorts along the way, did a body rappel down a small waterfall, getting myself rope burns in the process; and jumped off that bloody cliff, not allowing myself to look down because I knew that I would scare myself senseless.

But my favorite moment came during the final challenge, rappelling 65 feet down a cliff alongside a raging waterfall. Waiting for my turn at the ropes, I was quite a bundle of nerves. So when they strapped me onto the rope, all I could think of was going down that cliff as fast as I could. With my left hand, I held onto the rope and with my right, I started pulling. Pretty soon, I got the hang of it, and I started bouncing off the cliff walls. It was exhilarating!

I didn’t know what got into me—maybe it was my competitive nature, maybe it was fear, or maybe, just maybe, all those hours of watching senseless action movies had finally paid off!”