Questions people ask

Drive west out of Malaybalay City towards Barangay Kibalabag and keep climbing — allow about an hour. The sealed road gives way to gravel and packed earth on the upper stretches, and there is a river crossing near the end. Fill up in town: there is no fuel past the last barangay. Call us the morning you travel and we will tell you what the crossing is like that day. If you would rather not drive it yourself, we run a shuttle for ₱3,000 round trip, and habal-habal is ₱300 for two passengers per ride.

Rough for the last part, and a regular car manages it in dry weather if you take it slowly. The lower stretches out of Malaybalay are sealed; the upper ones are gravel and packed earth, and there is a river crossing close to the property. A pickup or an SUV is the easier drive by a wide margin. After heavy rain the last section is difficult without high clearance and the crossing can rise, so call us before you set out rather than after. Off-site parking is ₱100 a night if you would rather leave the car below.

Warm layers, a torch, and shoes you do not mind getting muddy. Kibalabag sits at roughly 1,300 metres and it gets genuinely cold after dark, which is the one thing guests underpack for. The cottages provide mattresses or beds, blankets and pillows; the ones with private bathrooms also provide towels, and Barkadahan Cottage Uno has kitchen utensils if you want to cook. If you are tent camping you bring your own tent, sleeping equipment and cooking utensils.

Do not count on it. Signal thins out badly on the road above the last barangay, so send anything urgent before you leave Malaybalay and tell whoever is expecting you that you may go quiet. CONFIRM(client): which networks reach the property itself has not been confirmed in writing — message us before you travel and we will tell you what to expect.

Ask us before you book if you need to charge or run equipment. CONFIRM(client): power at the property — mains, generator, hours it is on — is not settled in writing yet, and a guess here is the kind that leaves somebody with a flat phone on a mountain. Bring a power bank either way.

Not at the moment. None of the accommodations is set up to take animals, so the booking form will not let you add a pet. If you need to bring one, message us before you book rather than on the day.

Cool, damp and often misty, and colder at night than anything in the lowlands. Kibalabag is around 1,300 metres — some 700 metres above Malaybalay City, where the year runs between about 19°C and 30°C — so expect several degrees cooler than that up here, and a jacket after dark. The wet months run from roughly mid-May to late November, June being the wettest; December and January through April are the drier ones. Cloud moving through the site is normal rather than bad weather. It is where the name comes from.

Yes, and families are much of who books. The Family Cottage has two queen beds for four or five (six at a squeeze) with a private bathroom and breakfast for four, and the larger barkadahan cottages take ten and fifteen. There is a swimming pool, shared with the rest of the site except at Barkadahan Cottage Tres, which has its own. Three things to plan for: the access road is rough, the nights are cold, and CONFIRM(client): whether the pool is supervised is not confirmed — assume it is not and watch your own children.

From ₱250 per person per night for tent camping up to ₱12,500 a night for the largest cottage. The full rate card:

• Tent camping — ₱250 per person per night. Bring your own tent, sleeping equipment and cooking utensils.
• Car camping — ₱2,000 a night for one vehicle and up to five guests. Extra guests ₱250 each.
• Couple Cottage — ₱3,000 a night. One queen bed for two, private bathroom, breakfast for two.
• Family Cottage — ₱5,500 a night. Two queen beds for four or five, six at most, private bathroom, breakfast for four.
• Barkadahan Cottage Uno — ₱5,500 a night. Ten guests on foam mattresses, shared bathroom, kitchen utensils.
• Barkadahan Cottage Dos — ₱8,500 a night. Ten guests, private bathroom, breakfast.
• Barkadahan Cottage Tres — ₱12,500 a night. Fifteen guests, its own swimming pool, breakfast for ten.

Extra guests in the cottages are ₱300 each. A day tour without an overnight stay is ₱100 per person, plus ₱50 for pool access. Off-site parking is ₱100 a night, the shuttle is ₱3,000 round trip, and habal-habal is ₱300 for two passengers per ride. The price you see at checkout is the price: the whole booking is paid up front and nothing is due on arrival.

Your stay goes ahead and so does your booking — rain is normal here and is not a reason we cancel. What rain changes is the road: heavy rain makes the last section difficult without high clearance and can raise the river crossing, so call us the morning you travel and we will tell you what it looks like. If the property genuinely cannot host you — a typhoon, a road closure, a government order — that is force majeure and we refund everything you paid without you having to ask. A forecast you do not like is not force majeure, and cancelling because of one returns nothing.

Check in is from 3:00 PM and check out is 12:00 noon.

Bookings are non-refundable: cancelling returns no money, whatever the notice. Ninety days before your stay and the morning of it are the same answer, because your dates came off sale for everybody else the moment you booked them. You can still cancel and we would rather you did — your dates go back on sale immediately, so somebody else may be able to use them. The two exceptions are force majeure, where we refund everything you paid, and the owner's discretion, which is a judgement about one situation rather than a policy. The full wording is at Cancellation and refunds.