When In Manila and looking for the place to hold your Visita Iglesia this coming Holy Week, Pampanga is the perfect province to go to.
I can only speak for myself but I've associated Pampanga with 2 things: the Hot Air Balloon Festival I go to every year and the delicious processed meat Pampanga is famous for. I never thought of Pampanga as a place for Visita Iglesia because I've only ever associated it with recreational activities and great food.
Come April 5, Jigs and I went to Pampanga on a day trip organized by the Pampanga Tourism Board – right before Holy Week.
Our first stop was the Heroes Hall at San Fernando, Pampanga where we were given a warm welcome by the other members of the Pampanga Tourism Board plus the people from San Fernando, Pampanga. That was a great way to start the trip!
They served a lot of kakanin and bread for breakfast. I really loved the tamales and suman! I think I ate a lot which is ok since I knew we were going to have a long trip that day.
After breakfast, our first stop was the San Guillermo Parish Church at Bacolor, Pampanga. When you look at it from outside, you won't be able to tell that the main door was previously the upper choir loft entrance before. How awesome is that!
Upon entering the church, I was in so much awe since the interiors were so beautiful. The chandeliers with the wooden ceiling. The purple accents. The altar. The tour guide was even telling us that their attention was called because the wooden ceilings seemed dangerous and might collapse anytime. Good thing they didn't change it.
Why is the ceiling low, you ask? This is because around 3/4 of the church was gone because of the lahar from the Mt. Pinatubo explosion back in 1991.
So that's why the windows at the San Guillermo Parish Church is like this..
And guess what? This was where Santino lived before! I found that out while we were touring the museum inside. No wonder the production team chose this site; it's really beautiful.
The painting in the museum really caught my attention since they were all depictions of the Mt. Pinatubo explosion.
When we walked at the back, we saw this wide open space, which will be turned into a tree-planting site as fundraising for the church. This is also where we saw the back part of the San Guillermo Parish Church – the previous roof part, that is.