One of the biggest tourist attractions near KL is located north of the city, and it is a cave temple . It is not just any cave temple (we saw a few already in Ipoh), it is one of the most visited Hindu Temples in Malaysia, the famous Batu Caves. Monkeys (long-tailed macaques) abound as do tourists and Hindus.
The caves have been occupied for hundreds of years by a tribe of Orang Asil, the indigenous tribes of Malaysia, but only in the 1890s was a Hindu temple built inside the massive cave. Parishioners and tourists used to have to climb wooden steps up to the temples, but in 1940 concrete steps, 272 of them, were constructed. In 2018, these were painted in rainbow colors. We arrived at the first temple and saw all the monkeys. We were told not to bring food, and many of the monkeys were eating small bananas. I didn’t take any pictures of them with my phone since I didn’t want them stealing it.
We approached the second temple and the entrance to the Batu Caves.
We could see the 141 foot (43m) tall Murugan statue, painted in gold. Murugan is the Hindu God of War, and has many pseudonyms. The statue is the tallest in Indonesia, constructed in 2006. We could also see the rainbow color steps that we would have to climb to access the cave temples.
It was quite the walk up, and I was glad there was a railing to hold onto. Monkeys were here, too. We had to stop and look back at how far we had climbed.
We made it to the top, and saw the first Hindu cave temple, all colorful and adorned with many peacock statues. We also saw more stairs, but we decided to take our time here before heading up again.
We headed up the final staircase, to the highest temple, and the cave opened to the world above.
There were more monkeys up here, all over the walls of the cave, and some wandering on the ground, too.
There were many small shrines and wall reliefs throughout the caves.
We took a break on a bench, and wound up speaking with an Australian man who had just visited Cambodia, and that is where we are off to next, so it was fun to find out what he thought. After we cooled off we headed back down all those stairs.
We saw one building on the other side of the parking lot, and found it was the wedding hall. The peacocks painted on the door called us to check it out, but it was closed, no weddings today.
The Ramayana Cave is located right next door to the Batu Caves and we actually started there. There is a small fee to enter the caves and it is worth paying. The story of the Ramayana is one of the most famous in Hinduism, and I first learned of it when we visited Pramabanan Temple in Indonesia. Rama’s wife Sita is kidnapped by the demon king Ravana. Rama’s friend Hanuman, the monkey god, and the monkey army help Rama rescue Sita. A lot more occurs, and the cave is devoted to telling the whole story using many, many life-size dioramas. There is a huge statue outside of Hanuman and a Hindu temple just behind him.
Once inside, there are many scenes from the Ramayana on display; there is also the huge reclining statue of Kumbhakarna, who is the demon king(Ravana)’s brother.
The changing lights reflect off the cave and give it a very trippy vibe; there are steep stairs to climb to see other parts of the cave and give another perspective on the scenes below. There wasn’t much to see and if we would have done the Batu Caves stairs first, we probably would have skipped these.
We learned that many people skip the Ramayana Caves, as either they miss it on the way to Batu Caves, or don’t want to pay the small entrance fee. Either way, there were a lot less people here than at the Batu Caves. It is absolutely worth visiting as it is very cool, colorful, and so close.
We said goodbye to the caves, a big eagle statue and one more Hindu goddess statue, just in time, as the rain began soon after while we were in the taxi.
We had a great time exploring Batu Caves, even with all the people, its such a big space that there is room for everybody. If you visit, don’t miss Ramayana Cave, as it was really fun too!
