Left: At the little roadside stand. The large yellow fruits are Jackfruit.
Right: Me at Pura Danu.
| Lake Bratan Back | ||
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| Our appetites sedated we continued on. The view from this lovely mountain road was spectacular: Rice fields climbing mountains, bamboo forests, deep gorges where rivers rushed down to the sea and all the time the distant volcanoes braking the skyline. | ||
| We stopped at a roadside stand to buy Made some corn, (every time we, Nyoman and I, drove into the mountains we had to stop & buy corn for Made.) she loves corn and it only grows in the dryer, cooler climate of the highlands. All the kids bought fruit and I Picked up some manggis, (mangosteens) a fruit I've come to love. | ||
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Left: At the little roadside stand. The large yellow fruits are Jackfruit. Right: Me at Pura Danu. |
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| After about an hour and a half we reached the lake where the goddess resides. I still, (This was my second trip to this temple.) couldn't believe the beauty of this place. Pura Ulun Danu Bratan sits on a small island near the shore in a gorgeous crater lake, in a lovely park, high in the highlands of western Bali. | ||
| Few tourist make this pilgrimage, so you don't have to fight the crowds you would at say: Besakih or Tanah Lot. (Fewer tourist, fewer hawkers.) There is a row of shops as you enter the park, selling everything from food to woodcarvings, but not to many hawkers, ahhhhh! | ||
| The temple, built by the King of Mengwi in 1633, consists of four compounds. One honoring Wisnu in his manifestation as the lake goddess "Dewi Danu." protector of all life, one honoring Brahma and a few others. | ||
| In the park that surrounds this area of the lake more then 650 species of trees have been recorded & there are 459 different wild and cultivated orchids. | ||
| We walked around for awhile, it was refreshing in the cooler mountain air. I took some photo's, & bought a "T" shirt and some postcards and we climbed back into the car and headed for Tanah Lot and the famous sunset. Continued | ||