One will never know what it is like to be a Filipino until one has visited historic Vigan. I have lost count of the many times I have traveled to Vigan, but my enthusiasm for this charming town has never waned. This Christmas 2008, my visit is tinged with nostalgia because I am traveling only with my three granddaughters, whose last visit was 7 years ago.

About 400 kilometers from Manila is the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Vigan. On 2 December 1999, this historic town was inscribed in the World Heritage List as the best-preserved example of a planned Spanish colonial town in Asia with a unique European atmosphere. In the Philippines, it is the oldest surviving Spanish colonial city in the Philippines.

On the first day of our Christmas holiday tour, we revisited several landmarks and interesting places around the town on a horse-drawn calesa: the old Bantay Church and its famous belltower, the Pagburnayan (stone jar-making factories), the Hidden Garden in a remote barangay, Crisologo Museum, and the old streets in Mestizo District leading to Plaza Burgos and Plaza Salcedo.

The Shrine of Nuestra SEÑORA de la CARIDAD in Bantay is home to the venerated our Lady of Charity, patroness of Nueva Segovia. Built in 1591, the church features earthquake baroque and Gothic-influenced architecture. Its belfry located a few meters away was used as a lookout point, and the site was a favored location for many local films.

At the Pagburnayan, we witnessed a demonstration of the making of burnay potteries. The burnay is an earthenware jar crafted by a potters hands with the aid of a potters wheel. It uses fine sand (anay) as a tempering material and fired at a high temperature in a huge brick-and-clay ground kiln that makes it harder and more durable than other terra cotta. The local bagoong (fish sauce), sugarcane vinegar and basi wine would not taste as good if not fermented in stoneware burnay jars.

The Hidden Garden is a vast landscape of nurtured lush gardens of bromeliads, ferns, palms, bamboo and bonsai. It boasts of large potted bird's nest ferns, bromeliads girding a miniature waterfall or providing ground cover for a clump of bamboo, air plants growing on driftwood, and bonsai and ornamental stones dividing a pathway.

On the way to Crisologo Museum, we passed by the Simbaan a Bassit, the local cemetery chapel. Built in the 1850s, the uniqueness of the chapel lies in its being the only one in the region having an espadaña hung with bells.

The Crisologo Museum is an old two-storey building of durable concrete and hardwood, with colintipay windows at the second floor, and thick walls made of bricks, iron and steel window grills at the ground floor. Besides its rich collection of articles of historical value, antique furniture, santos (icon), it houses Congressman Floro Crisologo's memorabilia.

Mena Crisologo Street is the most famous cobblestone street of Vigan on the way to the town plaza. This most photographed street is lined with well-preserved houses now turned into museum shops, cafe, or tourist inns. Day or night, stepping into this street of yesteryears brings back a dose of melancholic nostalgia.

We stayed at our family's ancestral house restored by my husband's parents in 1986 and named in memory of their mother, Dona Angela Verzosa y Villanueva. Villa Angela Heritage House is a charming, beautiful old house, filled with traces of the past. Located in the central part of Vigan, it was built by Gobernadorcillo Agapito Florendo y Bonifacio, who was a gobernadorcillo of Vigan, La Ciudad Fernandina, in 1859, and his beloved wife, Donya Maria Villanueva, and in time, was inherited by their grandniece, Donya Angela Villanueva y Florendo (married to Don Pastor Verzosa y Florentino), after whom this heritage house was named. Her youngest son, the late Engr. Candelario Villanueva Verzosa, together with his wife, Dra. Purificacion Lahoz Verzosa, painstakingly undertook the restoration of the house to preserve it as a lasting memento. It now serves as the family's repository of antiques, family memorabilia, and historic relics of yesteryears. Among its prominent celebrity guests include Tom Cruise, who stayed here while filming his movie Born on the 4th of July. The house was the setting of some memorable films like Jose Rizal, Gumising Ka, Maruja, Noli Me Tangere, and the TV series Ana Karenina.