ILOCOS, VIGAN, PAGUDPUD TRIP PART 5 : BATAC ILOCOS, EMPANADA, MARCOS MUSEUM AND MAUSOLEUM

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I was terribly hungry when we finished the “Malacanang of the North” visit and its perfect because our next stop would be the Empanada tasting. I have heared a lot about empanada of Ilocos , so I was pretty curious how it taste.

The just learned that Batac empanada has a lot of variations. There’s the ordinary empanada (just the papaya, bean sprouts and egg), ordinary eggless (just the vegetables), special empanada (with longganisa and egg), special eggless (with longganisa but no egg), special w/o mongo (everything except bean sprouts), jumbo empanada (with hot dog), double special (double longganisa and one egg), double egg (one longganisa and two eggs), and the heaviest of them all, the double double (double the longganisa and egg). They even serve just the crust which they call pinais.

The famous empanada

That was already lunch time so we did not only taste the empanada but we ate our lunch of course. And since we are in Ilocos , we tried again the bagnet -PhP 70/serving; rice –PhP12/serving; pinakbet –PhP 40/serving; Igado (which looked and taste like Bopis)- PhP50/serving and the special empanada –PhP40/pc

The Marcos Museum and Mausoleum

After our lunch we immediately proceeded to the Marcos Museum and Mausoleum which is just a few meters away .

Memorabilia of the late Philippines President Ferdinand E. Marcos is being showcased in The Marcos Museum and Mausoleum in Batac, Ilocos Norte .The Mausoleum is a large stately and gloomy tomb housing his embalmed remains which are contained in a vacuum-sealed glass coffin. Outside the Mausoleum are vendors selling some snack items and signs that many people are visiting the place. The Museum is the first structure seen from the main street and is the one which follows the lines of a colonial wood-and-brick house, with solid ground floor walls and an upper storey of wood decorated with floral motifs. The Mausoleum is a cube of adobe blocks and is stepped towards the top of the structure. The dark interior is divided into an entry foyer in which are exhibited old English standards and a bust of the former president. Unfortunately, cameras are not allowed inside.

Marcos Mausoleum with vendors outside.

Ferdinand Edralín Marcos (September 11, 1917 – September 28, 1989) was the tenth president of the Philippines, serving from 1965 to 1986. In 1972, he instituted an authoritarian regime that allowed him to stay in power until lifting it in 1981. He was elected the same year to another full term which was marred by personal health issues, political mismanagement and human rights violations by the military. In 1986, he was re-elected for the fourth time in a disputed snap election. As a result, that same year he was removed from office peacefully by the “People Power” EDSA Revolution. He has the distinction of being the last Senate President to be elected to the presidency and being the first president to be elected to two consecutive full terms.

Two decades after Marcos was chased from power, he still draws the faithful and the curious from this farming town. Displayed in an adobe mausoleum, his lavishly waxed corpse lies in a family tribute, bedecked in military medals and surrounded by faux flowers made of shells while Gregorian chants echo softly. Scores of school children visit nearly everyday, filing past souvenir peddlers for a look of the deposed dictator whom residents of Ilocos Norte province fondly call “Apo,” or the Old man.