Danao

10°30'38.0"N 123°56'45.2"E

6 min readApr 19, 2022

Climbing hasn’t been of great importance to me lately. For the past year, I have been mostly focused on getting to the world stage of adventure racing; contributing all of my time to team training. My climbing is, right now, put on the backburner.

I miss climbing hard a whole lot though.

There’s this newly (relatively) developed climbing area in Danao City, Cebu that has been on my radar for a few years now. Talks about this area is often spoken with hush tones in climbing circles, adding to its appeal.

This past Holy Week I got to see the area for the first time; it was a grand experience.

A panoramic view of Central Cebu Protected Landscape

A storm was raging at the start of Holy Week 2022. Ferry trips were canceled, and I had to spend a few nights in port just to secure a ferry crossing from Leyte to Cebu.

On Holy Thursday, I finally got my slot on the ferry and was glad to finally be on my way.

Holy Thursday brought the much needed good weather

The road from Danao City proper to the crag in Togonon, where the walls are, snaked its way into the mountains. As I drove closer to the area, I could hear my ears pop every so often, signaling some gain in elevation.

20 minutes into this road, I saw the massive limestone faces that jut out from the mountainside. I rolled down the window out of excitement — the cool mountain air blasting my face.

Taking high angle shots when this shower slowly creeped in; deciding to rap down and miss shots, or stay and get wet. I decided to get wet

Mountain huts were strewn at the base of these crags, a distinct trail leading up to the cliffs.

The approach to the crags was the first thing that struck me — it was this beautifully cleaned out trail with panoramic views of the mountains on the left, and massive limestone walls to the right.

Aljin, the developer of Danao, has been working on these crags for the past 7 years. Devoting a lot of his time and resources to putting up these sport routes.

I have high admiration for crag developers knowing the sheer effort it takes to put up even just a single sport route.

He mentions that Danao’s walls can, at most, have around 250 sport routes. That is a lot! Mostly rivaling that of Kiokong, Bukidnon’s numbers.

I catch up to the group of climbers in an area they called the Dihedral Wall — named aptly so because it was a *dihedral wall*. The second thing that struck me was how tall these walls were.

If you’ve ever been on Neverending in Area 5 of Cantabaco, these routes were mostly as tall as Neverending. By my estimates, you’d need at least 20 draws for most of Danao’s routes.

My stay was spent catching up to close friends, getting to know new ones, as well as, taking photos (my main goal here), and mostly getting a feel for the area.

It was inspiring to see everyone just trying to tick grade after grade on these sport routes — making me wish I was in a better climbing shape so I could bear down hard; alas no. 6a it is for me at this point in time.

I did try a line, and another thing that struck me were the distances between bolts. They were just right, and of enough distance, to not make you psyche out on runouts. The bolts, too, were glue-ins, something I’ve only seen in Tonsai, Thailand. The glue-ins should be more apt for limestone, but are way more expensive.

Over the many years, I have been to most of the climbing areas in the country. Each area has an appeal.

Cantabaco: mostly hard, single pitch sport climbing.
Poog: pockets and more pockets
Igbaras: exposure
Samar: rawness and Deep Water Solos
Kiokong: a billion routes of varying lengths spread across many areas
Benguet: Cold weather bouldering
Montalban: Accessibility from Manila, and history of the crag

Aljin’s area in Danao has its own appeal.

It’s a remote, mountainous area, mostly cut off from the distractions brought by cellular service.

It’s an area with massive limestone faces with sport climbing for all skill levels.

It’s mountain huts with views of Cebu Island’s rugged terrain: paved and unpaved roads weaving in and out of the baranggays, posing the potential for outdoor sports other than climbing.

It’s an area, given it’s proximity to me right now, I will be frequenting often after my races are done.