Sunset at Pura Tanah Lot

Our last stop during our tour of Bali, Indonesia was Tanah Lot. In the Balinese language, it means "land in the sea". It is home to the Pura Tanah Lot, where the deity named Dang Hyang Nirartha is worshipped by Hindus in the area, along with the main sea god of the Balinese.

Our driver, Jek, wanted to make sure that we arrived in plenty of time before sunset because there were so many things to see before we even saw the temple. For instance, this candi bentar (split gate) was already a show stopper. It is guarded by two giant statues of characters from Balinese mythology, although I don't know who they are. The candi bentar itself is intricately adorned. Seeing it reminded me of Prof. Zafaralla discussing the various elements of Earthquake Baroque while my Humanities II class stared at the façade of the Paoay Church.

I was amazed at the detail of the Balinese statues. For some reason, they reminded me of the temple guards I've seen in Jeongeungsa Temple... but the Tanah Lot guards looked richer because they were dressed, head to toe, in gold.

On the side of the road, tourists could get refreshments before walking into the temple compound. Val and I chose to have coconut water, which we knew was safe because we were drinking it from coconuts. There were other street food on offer like flavoured grilled corn on the cob, tempeh, and banana fritters, and boiled peanuts. But we decided to skip them because we haven't reached the temple yet.

Once inside the temple compound, we realised just how popular Tanah Lot is. It's crowded with tourists! We arrived at the viewpoint just in time to see part of the temple silhouetted by sunset. The stone outcrop has a cave-like feature. I can just imagine how it must look during high tide when the waves are splashing all around it. It was an awesome view. 

Typical me. I wanted to take a closer look so I convinced Val to go down to the beach with me. After all, even though the sun was setting, there were still a lot of people down there. It was quite a challenge because the stairs were steep and the final descent involved climbing down large and smooth stones. We were so glad we decided to go there because the view at this perspective was also beautiful.

Climbing up was also a challenge. Especially since I was carrying a tote rather than a backpack. But we had to hurry because we also wanted to see the other parts of the temple compound. What we didn't realise was that we chose to visit on an auspicious day. The Balinese were celebrating Purnama, their full moon festival. Part of their celebrations is offering of flowers and fruit in baskets made of leaves. The offerings I took this photo of was found right outside a temple with a smaller candi bentar. A metal gate barred non-Hindus from entering this temple so we just stayed outside, soaking more of the view.

And then, the full moon rose. This marked the end of the Balinese observance (I think) because they all started going out of the temple compound. We tourists remained, awed by the sight of this large orange moon. 

Soon after, we filed out of the temple compound as well. This is one of the most beautiful places we've seen in Bali and we're glad we weren't in a hurry to go to another location. We really just had to soak in the sights, sounds, and smells of the Tanah Lot temple compound.