Sagada

This picture should be at the end!  Some of you know what
a techno tard I am, but I can't get the picture to move!  Oh, well.

E England - should be at the end.

We start the hike down to the "coffin cave."

E/S Dial

Looking up

Our guide, Ben, explaining about the cave.  The tradition was
that in order for the dead person to continue in this life and the hereafter,
and to be accessible for visiting their kin, they were placed
in coffins and stored in the mouth of the cave, or hung on
ledges outside.  Mothers who died in childbirth, were
not placed with others, but at the outside of the cave.
They were thought to have been evil.

Sister Wong, E/S Dial, S Larsen, E/S Gozart, S Lake

S Lake/S Samuel

Thank goodness for a rail

Down, down

Down some more

Our first look at the coffins.  It took a while to pick them out.

More explaining.  The coffins are all small except a few.  We
naturally assumed they were children, but Ben explained
that after a person dies and is put into the death chair,
they are then folded into the fetal position so as to
return to the state they were in when born.

Coffins

When Christian missionaries arrived, the practice of
placing the body in the prone position was started, hence
the longer coffins.  These coffins are actually made from
a tree.  They are hollowed out and the top
cut off for the lid.

Coffins

More coffins

Still more coffins

Our group

S Enlgand, S Wong & S Samuel climbing up.

This is the view looking out of the cave.  The coffins
do get sunlight in the morning.

Comfort stop after the trek and before the next cave.

A large limestone cave, which we didn't go into as we
needed three more guides with lanterns and ropes.  I
guess it is on the order of Lehman Cave and Mt. Timpanogos.

T-shirt time!

Picking out just the right one.  E Larsen, S England, S Dial

Mom and baby - the owner