Day 317- Yogyakarta, Indonesia

BOROBUDUR AND PRAMBANAN (14/11/09)

Before dawn we set off from Yogyakarta in order to visit the famous Buddhist temples of the area before the tour buses rolled in. As the sun rose over the horizon it reflected beautifully in the paddy fields.

Our first destination was Borobudur, one of the largest Buddhist temples in the world. The temple is an enormous square with steep steps like these on each side, rising through nine levels to the top. The bottom six are square, the top three round. The diagram below (stolen from wikipedia) should give you a rough idea. Each side is about 118m (387ft) long.

The main entrance is guarded by two large stone lions.

Each level consists of a wide pathway right the way around the entire structure. Since the temple rises in steps, the higher you are, the shorter the path round.

The three round layers at the top, with this large dome in the middle, are circled by 72 of these huge perforated domes, known as Stupas.

This Stupa has had the top removed revealing the large statue of Buddha inside. Amazingly all 72 Stupas are the same, despite the fact that when complete the statues are barely visible through the holes. In total there are 504 statues of Buddha in the temple.

The scale of the Stupas can only be appreciated with people next to them.

The geometry of the architecture is absolutely flawless.

As we were walking around we were stopped by a number of Indonesian students who wanted to practice their English. We were more than happy to talk to them, especially considering how grateful they were.

Almost every wall in Borobudur is covered with one of these intricately carved relief panels. Amazingly there are 2,672 of these in all.

Each panel contains different characters and stories from Buddhist mythology. We would like to tell you who this is but unfortunately we don't know.

The spectacular temple from the bottom layer.

On the way to our next destination we stopped briefly at another small Buddhist Temple. Despite it's small size it had an enormous statue of Buddha inside.

The other famous Buddhist temple of the region is called Prambanan. We approached the main temple buildings through it's lovely landscaped gardens.

The towering main building of the temple, very different from the architecture of Borobudur.

This was, 4 years ago, one of the largest and most spectacular temple complexes in the World with 237 separate temples of varying sizes spread over a relatively small area. Sadly an enormous earthquake in the region in May 2006 destroyed almost all the ancient stone buildings. An ambitious reconstruction project is underway, although so far just a handful of the principal temples have been finished. We felt quite somber as we wandered around the ruins imagining what an incredible place this must have been before it's devastation.

Extensive work was evident all around but the sheer scale of the work to be done makes it hard to believe that the complex will be restored any time in the foreseeable future.

This chubby giant, along with his twin opposite, apparently survived the earthquake unscathed.

At another section of the temple complex this was one of just a couple of temples on which the rebuilding work had been completed.

Back in Yogyakarta we went for a late lunch and ended up trying, mostly out of curiosity, deep-fried ice-cream. A scoop of ice cream is battered and fried very briefly, ensuring it doesn't have time to melt. It was actually quite delicious, although it gave Adam near instant stomach ache, despite having shared the portion with Elinor.