:: San Juan de Nepumuceno Church ::
"It took a man of strong character, Fray Geronimo Vaquerinto manage and build the most enduring physical project of Anini-y - the colonial baroque church. the men worked on the walls and carried the heavy loads, women and children brought the needed sand and stones to the job site while hermenas volunteered for food and procurement and preparation. This project affirmed the fact that the people of Anini-y can accomplish outstanding feat, only if everyone contributed to the effort as much as they could." Thus, should read the epithet for this pride of Anini-y.
This tourism destination is conducive to educational and cultural experience for the tourists and travelers, both local and foreign. This massive coral white building with an outside measure of 60 x 40 meter and a three-storey �campanario� on a 10 x 10 meter foundation is an enduring legacy of the historic past. Its 4 brass bells that arrived from Europe in 1895 are all broken and no longer toll for the people to gather but no activity and facility are needed to draw sightseers to this site as the structure itself is the attraction. It is the only church of Spanish vintage still existing in the province. As one of Antique�s oldest, the building has withstood earthquakes and outbursts of man and nature. The century-old Spanish Church is located at the catholic plaza, which is situated at the heart of Poblacion like most of the community plazas established during the Spanish Period. The plaza amidst a well manicured lawn and lined with various shrubs intermingled with timber and fruit trees covers an area of 0.8855 hectares.
The designer of the world heritage church in Miag-ao, Iloilo was the same designer for this baroque church. Likewise, it was mastercrafted by the same craftsmen from Igbaras who led the building of the Miag-ao edifice. The 1-meter thick side and back walls are made of coral stones stacked above each other and held together by a special blend of �apog� and straw. The fa�ade, massive columns, and blocks where figures and designs were sculpted are specially hewn blocks from big coralline stone.
The Poblacion is very accessible from the regional center or the provincial capital. Seven local buses plying the Iloilo Anini-y route provide daily transport service to the area. While a lot of improvements and concreting works have been done to the Anini-y �Tiolas Section of the national road, local visitors from Iloilo Province would travel more leisurely if those portions that remain unpaved are regularly maintained.
In 1999, there were 12 public utility jeepneys that ply daily the San Jose-Anini-y route, but as of this writing the number has increased to 22 units. Moreover, 53 tricycles operate within the municipality and are also available even at nighttime on special arrangement. The DPWH has preserved the Guinsang-an-Anini-y road section as a first-class gravel road. This paved the way for many tourists whose number and comings remained unrecorded and some unnoticed, to visit the site directly and without passing the local government office. Observably, there are at least 3 educational tours to this place in a year. The local church officials do not charge anything for these visits, but the visitors must make arrangement with the priest for ocular walk inside of the church.