FROM 29,035 FEET TO 525 FEET‘Ain’t no mountain low enough’

First posted 05:54am (Mla time) June 27, 2006
By Carmela Reyes
Inquirer

http://news.inq7.net/archive_article/index.php?ver=1&index=1&story_id=6829

Editor's Note: Published on page A2 of the June 27, 2006 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer

DOÑA REMEDIOS TRINIDAD, Bulacan -- Contrary to the popular song, for Mount Everest conquerors Leo Oracion and Erwin Emata there “ain’t no mountain low enough.”

The two, who conquered the world’s highest peak at 29,035 feet last month, joined 100 Bulacan officials and environmentalists in an easy trek up 525-foot Mt. Manalmon in the Biak-na-Bato mountain range here on Monday.

It took Oracion and Emata 35 minutes to summit Manalmon, while it took the other trekkers one-and-a-half hours. It had taken the two several days to summit Everest and months before that to acclimatize themselves to the severe weather conditions.

Oracion, who climbed Biak-na-Bato for the third time, said the group was concerned about the environment and the protection of the country’s mountain ranges.

“Our world is the mountain. Our life revolves around it. Biak-na-Bato is not a simple mountain but a historical landmark,” he said.

“Perhaps if Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo, who encamped here during the revolution, were alive today he would be very angry at the quarrying operations,” he said, referring to the controversial operations of Rosemoor Mining and Development Corp. on Mt. Nabio, another peak in the Biak-na-Bato mountain range.

At the end of the climb, the participants signed a declaration to protect the Biak-na-Bato national park and to put a stop to the mining activities in the area.

Marble quarrying operations at Biak-na-Bato had been ordered stopped by the courts for several years now.

On Saturday, Environment Secretary Angelo Reyes said he was simply carrying out a status quo order on Rosemoor’s quarrying operations when he allowed the firm to transport the marble previously carved from the mountain out of the park for export.

The status quo order would be in effect while government experts studied the legal aspects of Rosemoor’s marble quarrying operations at the park.

Reyes said the order did not nullify the ore transport permit of Rosemoor that covered the hauling of almost 800 cubic meters of marble boulders.