The Park-and-Church-Visit Route of 2013

UST Church

Loreto in Sampaloc

Narrow Intramuros streets

I love taking pictures of churches.  So even if most my friends find it tacky to always have a camera in tow, I have mine at hand when we went on our annual Visita Iglesia.  We usually find a varied route from what we followed the previous year. This year our choices were dictated by ease of parking.  It seems that more people chose to stay put in the city like us so we encountered traffic and parking difficulty even if it was Holy week.  

The closed Manila Cathedral

The car-filled Manila streets

San Agustin being renovated

We found ourselves visiting the usuals starting with UST church and Loreto.  In San Sebastian, parking was impossible so we proceeded to the narrow but surprisingly easier-stop streets of Intramuros. After a couple of years, again I got to enter San Agustin church and marvel at its intricate interiors. But we missed Manila Cathedral as it was still closed for renovations.

Lourdes Church

Church beside Walter Mart

Our last three stops were our neighorhood churches.  Surprisingly Walter Mart at E. Rodriguez Avenue was open.  It made parking in the church beside it a bit harder.  I love visiting the small church because of its simple but elegant interiors (but I always forget the name of the church).  This year I found its garden renovated using a lot of native plants. Flowering native sanggumay were used to adorn the Virgin Mary grotto near the entrance. 

Sto. Domingo

Our yearly staple is visiting Sto. Domingo church and ending with Lourdes which I regularly visited when I was a child (I am a Lourdesian). Both are also becoming harder to visit with influx of cars and vehicles.  Sigh! But nevertheless, I will post pictures of these churches.