Bagacay Point Lighthouse in Transitions of Light

And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
And God, looking on the light, saw that it was good...
- Genesis 1:3-4, KJV

For the past weekends, I spent my afternoons in revisiting Bagacay Point Lighthouse in Liloan, Cebu, all the time hopeful for a magnificent dusk... And heavens obliged in grace...

I really wanted to have early morning shots but with the play of colors that was handed to me in the first dusk I have witnessed in Bagacay, I kept returning and I gratefully feasted with my eyes and prayed all the while that I may be able to capture the beauty of light in those afternoons.

The Bagacay Point Lighthouse stands on the land allocated by the American Governor General Howard Taft in 1904. The structure stands at 72 feet with lights reaching up to 17 nautical miles. It guides vessels sailing through the northeast harbor of Cebu. It is one among several lighthouses showing significant examples of American architecture in the country. It was declared a national historical landmark in 2004 (translated from the Filipino inscription in the lighthouse's historical landmark marker).

The lighthouse was never in solitude from visitors. In all the weekend afternoons that I have been there, I was the lone photo enthusiast among joggers, cyclists, students, lovers, actors and actresses. In my last visit, a local television channel crew was shooting some scenes for its soap opera. I decided to capture their images in silhouette.



In the times I have wandered in the grass fields in the lower plains of Bagacay Point, I was always accompanied by grazing cows. One time, after finding an appropriate vantage point, I set up my tripod and tried taking some base exposures. There were two cows before me. I was not worried about them since I was planning on taking silhouettes. And then, from my viewfinder I noticed a third cow slowly walking towards me. I adjusted my exposure and took pictures of the cow. He stopped just before me with his face in full portrait and ears wide open. After I took his last portrait, I literally told him a voce that I have already taken a full portrait. After that, he moved out of the way.





The Transitions of Light

Out of the several visits I made, I was able to witness magnificent displays of light: nostalgic warm skies, fiery dabs from red-orange pallettes and cool blue skies...

TRANSITIONS IN WARM NOSTALGIC SKIES

TRANSITIONS IN RED-ORANGE PALETTES

TRANSITIONS IN COOL BLUE SKIES

Indeed, light is good and so is the Hand that painted its transitions...

From the Archives: Bagacay Point Lighthouse in Liloan

The sun has always been hiding during early mornings these past weekends. There have been occasional rain showers too. These prevented me from venturing out early to do my wanderings.

For the past weeks, I have been yearning for a fine early morning weather so that I could go out and take additional photos for my project on Cebu and Bohol lighthouses. Next in my list is the Bagacay Point lighthouse in Liloan, Cebu. Liloan is a municipality situated 11 km northeast of Cebu City.

The Bagacay Lighthouse was built in 1904 by the order of the American Governor General Howard Taft. The lighthouse is a declared national historical landmark.

Last Saturday, I went to Punta Bagacay, Liloan late in the afternoon to take some low light shots of the lighthouse. Since the sky is always clear during the afternoons, low light shots would be fine. The sky was also clear when I checked for stars at around 11PM that night. I thought that a fine weather awaits the next day. I woke up early hoping to take early morning pictures. To my dismay, it was already raining.

With nothing else to do, I reviewed my stock photos. And then I saw my old shots of the lighthouse taken some time in 2005 and 2006. They actually belonged to some rolls of films that survived the termite attack in my boarding house early last year. And so, I had them digitized for posterity.

I remembered that during our first trip to the lighthouse, there were three of us who had still cameras, and one of us had a video camera. He has studied film-making and he made a short movie of our photo shoot. The video was actually very good. However, it did not make its way to Youtube. :)

On the first trip, we arrived very early and we were able to observed the sunrise at Bagacay Point.



After several minutes, we made a tour of the entire area. The operational lighthouse is actually situated in an elevated plain. 



In the lower plain adjoining the coastline, the ruins of the older lighthouse thought to be operational from 1874 to 1908 can be seen. I was actually the first one to reach the old lighthouse. During that time (some pounds ago), I had the courage to do a self-portrait, with both lighthouses in the background.



When the sun was already high, we took a break under a black plum tree and we had a group picture. (From R-L, starting up: Al Caballes, Kim Cortes, Charlou Famorcan and Kim's little sister. Standing, R-L: Orven Capuras, the film-maker, and this author.)



In 2006, I have revisited the lighthouse alone and unfortunately it was an overcast day. I tried to explore other perspectives for the lighthouse. I think that the overcast sky helped fit the description of lighthouses as lonely sentinels of the sea.



Bagacay Point has been undergoing some changes in the past years. I had my fears when I decided to take some low light shots because the lighthouse was quite secluded despite the presence of security guards in the area. There is currently a high-end village being constructed around the lighthouse. Due to this, it has become more accessible. There is a new access road that leads straight from the adjoining residential area of Bagacay to the lighthouse. I actually took my time last Saturday, wandering in the fields with cows still grazing in the dark, until 7PM.

I will share the recent images soon...