On board a car, I left Manila at 4:30 AM for a road trip to Laoag City, my birthplace, to join my parents, brother, sisters, their respective families and my son for a Christmas celebration and reunion. It had been years since I had my last road trip to Laoag City at daytime. For the past years and months, I’ve been visiting my parents ( in their early 80s) by plane or by commercial bus trips during nighttime.

To my surprise, there had been so many changes on the things you see along the highway towards Northern Luzon. I told my driver and security detail who are both from the Ilocos provinces that there are so many buildings and structures newly-constructed along the road to include new municipal halls, new public markets, new big houses of OFWs, new Banks and commercial establishments to include popular fastfood outlets. My staff were laughing after hearing my comment.

But what is very disturbing is that the road to the North “never changed” since I was driving my 1970 VW “Beetle” during my Lieutenant days (late ’70s)! This is specially imminent from Urdaneta, Pangasinan, all the way to the Ilocos Provinces. It is still the same highway that former President Marcos built and improved—uneven asphalted highway brought about by uneven fillings on potholes and cracks; narrow shoulders on both sides of the road which are not yet paved; and the same vegetation on both sides of the road.

Slow traffic on daytime is also a “pain in the ass” for travelers. This is brought about by the presence of big trucks and cargo haulers (railway train could have decongested our roads from these cargo trucks); presence of slow-moving tricycles near and on urban centers; passenger bus and jeeps stopping along the road when getting or dropping off passengers; and the presence of people and animals crossing the highway 

This 12-hour trip also gave me the opportunity to play and listen to my “old” CD music collections (on the car’s CD player)–Michael Bolton; 1st Bee Gees Album; Dave Brubeck Quartet; Johnny Mathis; Keiko Matsui; Acoustic Alchemy; Ray Conniff and his Orchestra & Chorus; Diane Schuur; Dianne Reeves; Eric Clapton; Bob Marley; Peter White; Sting; and James Brown.

I could still remember in the ’80s (President Marcos time) when a group of national runners/athletes would run the distance from Laoag City to Manila in an individual relay with the last runner reaching Manila on the day of our National Independence. After the 1986 People’s Power, a group of Ilocanos who were supporters of former President Marcos and local politicians who were removed from their offices by the former President Cory Aquino walked from Laoag City to Manila to air their grievances and protest to the President. Another “National Candidate” in the past elections would run/jog along this highway to campaign from one town to another.

This highway/route is very the same route that our forefathers used before, during the Spanish times and up to the present.

The distance from Manila to Laoag City is 488 kilometers or 305 miles. Running at an average of 20 miles a day, I could reach Manila in 15 days!

I reached Laoag City at 4:00 PM and there was no enough time and strength for me to have my long run. I opted to talk to my parents and prepared my running gears for tomorrow’s long run.