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You don’t need a time machine to get a feel of how the so-called principalia, or the noble class, lived during the Spanish era. In fact, you can live the way they did for a weekend. A two-and-a-half-hour drive from Manila could take one to Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar (The Philippine Houses of Acuzar), a sprawling resort in Bagac, Bataan, filled with restored Spanish mansions.

The 400-hectare park was built starting 2003 by property developer New San Jose Builders owned by Jose “Gerry” Acuzar. Acuzar himself chose some 30 old houses and colonial buildings based on their historical, cultural and architectural value from various areas in the Philippines which were transplanted into the Bagac development. It was opened to the public in 2010.

(Photos by Rolen Facundo; text by Kim Arveen Patria)

Among the Spanish mansions reconstructed in Bataan’s Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar is Casa Jaen. The house was once home to the first mayor of the Neuva Ecija town of Jaen. (Photo by Rolen Facundo)

Casa Luna was built in 1850 and was owned by the Novicio family in what was then the town of Namacpacanâ€"now the municipality of Luna (after Antonio and Juan Luna)â€"in La Union. (Photo by Rolen Facundo)

It was once storage for rice and sugar, then a Japanese garrison during the World War II. Now, Casa Lubao stands in Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar in Bataan. Built in 1920, the house was owned by the Arastia and Vitug families of Lubao, Pampanga. (Photo by Rolen Facundo)

Unlike other structures in Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar which were dismantled and rebuilt, Casa Mexico was reconstructed using materials from a junkyard. It was rebuilt based on an old photograph of the house that once stood in Mexico, Pampanga. (Photo by Rolen Facundo)

Casa Quiapo, as its name suggests, once stood in the Quiapo District in Manila, on Hidalgo Street. It was the first campus of the University of the Philippines School of Fine Arts, whose first director was the mansion’s owner, Rafael Enriquez. (Photo by Rolen Facundo)

There’s a restaurant in Bataan’s Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar called the Marivent Café, housed in the resort’s Casa Unisan. The mansion built in 1839 for the Maxino family  is said to be the first “bahay na bato” in Unisan, Quezon. (Photo by Rolen Facundo)

Aside from the heritage houses, visitors to Bataan’s Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar may also stay at a hotel in Paseo de Escolta, a street lined with structures that mimic old commercial structures of Manila. (Photo by Rolen Facundo)

Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar in Bataan markets itself as a “living museum of Philippine customs and traditions.” Aside from reconstructing heritage houses from all over the Philippines, the resort also recreates the communities they once part of. (Photo by Rolen Facundo)