Taman Ayun Temple

This guide to Taman Ayun Temple traces its founding in 1634, when Gusti Agung Putu, the first king of Mengwi, built a moated ancestor shrine for his family alone, ringed by water meant to echo Mount Mahameru rising from a cosmic ocean. You'll hear about the split gates and courtyards that climb toward that illusion, and the tiered wooden meru shrines inside marking rungs of holiness. Listen for what the guide traces happening to the kingdom of Mengwi itself by the late 1800s, and what part of its story survived regardless.