City of Solo (Surakarta)

From Jakarta I arrived in City of Solo, located northeast of Yogyakarta, once the power kingdom of great Javanese ! A very small town in comparison to Jakarta but quite a nice place to take things slowly and have a nice stroll around the city. (I can do away with all the traffic jams after the few days in Jakarta !)

Not much to offer in terms of sight-seeing in the city itself, as people usually treat this town as a stop over before moving on to the other more popular destinations.

Started the journey by visiting the Kraton (Palace) in Solo. The place looks a bit old and I don't really know how to describe this place ....... its really a mixture of culture from Malay, Chinese, European etc .... (as what we call ROJAK in Malaysia !)
Main entrance to the palace (malay 'atap' style house with an european fountain statute)

The garden of the palace (resembling the Roman era)

Reception area is a mixture of malay and british.

After the Kraton, went outside of Solo city towards the mountain to this 2 interesting candhi (temples) :-
1) Candhi Ceto (a fertility temple !)
2) Candhi Sukuh (looks very similar to the Mayan temple in Mexico)
Both temples are tucked away in the mountains near Solo, off normal tourist trail !

Tooks more than 1 hour driving up the mountains to reach them but its definately worth the journey.....
The tea plantation on the way up to the temples.

And after more than an hour drive, finally reached Candhi Ceto. At first glance, i thought i was in Bali ! The design of the temple really look like what we find in Bali.
Did not know that it was a fertility temple until I walk further up the temple and found that there was a penis statute being prayed to by people there !!!!


Not forgetting about the view from the mountain down ! Breathtaking .....


Next stop, the Candhi Sukuh. Took another 30 minutes drive from Ceto to this temple and it really look like the "Maya Temple" in Mexico at first glance.... but just a mini size one-lah ! Wonder whether its related to the Mexico one ?
Its always good to see something that we don't see in our everyday life in Malaysia and expose to the culture of different people in the world !

During each moment that we are aware of something peaceful and beautiful, we water seeds of peace and beauty in us.