104 places · 7 areas

Places of the Bangsamoro

Islands and white sand, lakes in the highlands, mosques, falls and the old forts and houses of the sultanates: what is there, how to get there, and what to know before you go.

Ervin Malicdem · CC BY-SA 4.0Photo by Ervin Malicdem, CC BY-SA 4.0. Open the source file.

Beaches 6

Islands 11

Mosques 10

Lakes 5

Falls 5

Mountains 7

Nature 21

Heritage 22

Museums 5

Cities 2

Markets 2

Memory 8

Every place is traced to the pages it came from, and the guide’s own entries are the travel workspace’s. Photos are from Wikimedia Commons or English Wikipedia under free licences, each credited on the photo. 7 areas: Basilan, Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Norte and del Sur, Tawi-Tawi, Cotabato City and the Special Geographic Area.

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Lake Buluan with the mountains that surround it

Places · Lake

Lake Buluan

Buluan, Maguindanao del Sur

Bapa lolo · CC BY-SA 4.0Photo by Bapa lolo, CC BY-SA 4.0. Open the source file.

Overview

The third-largest lake in Mindanao, a wide shallow basin ringed by mountains.

Lake Buluan covers about 61 square kilometres and sits just 4.5 metres above sea level. It is shared between Buluan and Mangudadatu in Maguindanao del Sur and two towns of Sultan Kudarat province.

It is a basin of linked marshes where the Pulangi, Maanoy, Buluan and Alah rivers gather on their way to the Mindanao River, and it was once ringed by the Sultanate of Buayan. Snakehead, catfish, carp, milkfish and tilapia are fished here.

Mining in the neighbouring provinces is named as a threat to the lake.

The lake spans more than 6,000 hectares, about 70% of it shared between Buluan and Mangudadatu. Fish-pen farming of tilapia has grown here with fingerlings, boats and cages from the regional agriculture ministry, and fishers read the water's colour: green is good for the fish, reddish or very clear warns of bad weather.

Things to do

  1. 01Go out on the lake with a local boatmanFishers here catch snakehead, catfish, carp, milkfish and tilapia; go out only with a boatman, and ask about current conditions first.
  2. 02Watch the tilapia pens being fedFishers keep tilapia in pens on the lake, one of them more than a hectare; fingerlings are fed 3 times a day in fine-mesh nets before moving to larger pens.

Food to try

  • A fisherman hauls tilapia from his fish pen on Buluan Lake.BuluanBuluan Lake tilapiaTilapia from the lake's pens is sold as far as Davao, Pagadian and Cotabato City.Photo: Benyamen Cabuntalan/BIO
  • Banana-leaf parcels of pastil, one opened to show shredded meat over steamed rice.MaguindanaonPastilRice and shredded meat in a banana leaf — the region’s breakfast, and its icon.Photo: Obsidian Soul
  • A mound of yellow turmeric rice, the kiyoning or kuning of Moro tables, topped with chicken in palapa.MaguindanaonKiyoningTurmeric rice, yellow and fragrant, cooked in coconut milk.Photo: Obsidian Soul
  • Lacy discs of tinagtag, the fried rice-flour snack sold at Ramadhan stalls in Maguindanao del Sur.MaguindanaonTinagtagA lattice of fried rice-flour batter, crisp and sweet.Photo: Bangsamoro Information Office

The food is halal. Named eateries come from dated listings, so check they are still open.

Sourcesen.wikipedia.org ·bangsamoro.gov.ph ·en.wikipedia.org