Lake Apo

Lake Apo is a crater lake in Barangay Guinoyoran in the city of Valencia in Bukidnon province in the Philippines. It is located in a hilly area about in elevation, about WSW of the city poblacion (town center). Lake Apo was awarded the cleanest inland body of water in Northern Mindanao Region (Region X) in the late 1990s. The green body of water has an estimated area of with maximum depths reaching up to 26m.EtymologyThe name of the lake come from the bisaya term apo, meaning elder or grandparent. According to legend, there was a man living in the mountains who assaulted his granddaughter and was punished by the mountain deities for his disrespectful act by flooding the area forming the Lake Apo.GeologyThe lake is a crater lake, a basin formed on an old volcanic cone that was later filled with water. It was erroneously reported as a circular rift lake, as this area is not a rift zone but a volcanic area evident by the presence of nearby volcanic peaks like Musuan Peak (7km to the E), Mount Kalatungan (20km to the NW), Mount Dagumbaan (10km to the SW), Mount Kidongin (25km to the SW), and the volcanic field east of Pangantucan, Bukidnon (7km to the west). Another small volcanic cone is located just 2km southwest of Lake Apo.