Borobudur

the Borobudur temple, located about forty kilometers from Yogyakarta, dominates the surrounding landscape.
It is a unique place, the largest Buddhist temple in the world.

Its history is incredible and can be compared to the discovery of Pompeii.

It was built in the 9th century by the Sailendra dynasty with the help of 10,000 slaves who worked continuously for 75 years, but during a great volcanic eruption it was completely buried by debris, which made it lose its traces and gave rise to local stories in which this was mentioned as legendary place. With the country's definitive conversion to Islam, the temple, now rendered unrecognizable by the dense layer of vegetation, was forgotten.

The complex was rediscovered in 1814 thanks to the love for archeology of Sir Thomas Raffles, the English governor of the island of Java, during the war between Holland and England.
The archaeological team unearthed one of the most impressive wonders that man has ever built, having a square base with a side of 123 meters that rises 35 meters over 10 levels, consisting of 1,600,000 huge blocks of gray lava stone, with more than 2600 bas-reliefs and about 500 life-size statues of the Buddha!!!

The ascension of the three levels of the temple represents the spiritual path towards Nirvana, and once at the top the great dome is surrounded by numerous perforated stupas, in the shape of a bell, which conceal the statues of Buddha within them. The effort of the climb is rewarded by the tropical landscape that can be seen in the distance, and once you get off you can visit the museum that explains in detail the history of this rediscovered mountain temple.

It was also a great challenge to take pictures of the bells without passing tourists: try it!

Ps: We have read that it is possible to organize an early morning entrance to the temple to see it at dawn in its splendor, still closed, without the continuous and large daily tourist influx.

Prambanan

After lunch we went to Prambanan, which is about an hour and a half by road from Borobudur.

The huge Hindu temple complex, the largest in all of Indonesia, was built around the same time as that of Borobudur. The main area consists of 3 slender temples of considerable height, dedicated to Shiva (God of time and destruction), Brahma (God of creation), and Vishnu (God of protection).
Scenes from the Ramayana, an epic poem of Indian origin, are depicted in finely carved bas-reliefs.

The area includes hundreds of other minor temples that have fallen into ruin after centuries of earthquakes, which can be reached by taking a pleasant walk with the opportunity to taste some mangoes fallen from the trees (if you can, avoid doing it in broad daylight as unfortunately we did, who tasted a very good mango, but hot!)