A 42-metre gold statue, 272 painted steps, a limestone cavern with a temple in it, and monkeys that will take your food.
Thirteen kilometres north of the centre, a 400-million-year-old limestone outcrop rises out of the plain with caves in it, and one of those caves has been a Hindu temple since 1891.
What you see
The Lord Murugan statue at the foot of the steps: 42.7 metres of concrete over a steel frame, covered in gold paint, unveiled in 2006. It is the tallest statue of a Hindu deity in Malaysia and among the tallest anywhere.
The 272 steps, repainted in bands of rainbow colour in 2018 — a change made without heritage approval that caused a considerable row, and which has become the most photographed thing at the site.
The Temple Cave at the top, a vast limestone chamber roughly 100 metres high with an opening to the sky at the far end and shrines inside. The scale of it is the point; photographs do not convey it.
The Ramayana Cave at the base, separately ticketed, with brightly painted dioramas of the epic and a 15-metre Hanuman outside. It is gaudy, cheerful and worth the small fee.
The Dark Cave, a conservation-managed cave system with its own ecosystem including the trapdoor spider Liphistius batuensis, found here and almost nowhere else. Access has been suspended and resumed at various points — check before counting on it.
Thaipusam
The Tamil festival held on the full moon of the Tamil month of Thai, usually in January or February.
Around a million people come. Devotees carry kavadi — decorated frames borne on the shoulders — and many pierce their skin, cheeks and tongues with skewers and hooks as acts of penance and thanksgiving, then climb the 272 steps.
It is one of the largest Hindu gatherings outside India, and it is an extraordinary thing to witness. It is also enormously crowded, and if you intend to go, arrive very early, expect to move slowly, and be conscious that you are a guest at a religious event and not at a spectacle.
The rules
Dress code is enforced. Knees and shoulders covered, for everyone. Sarongs are available to hire at the bottom for a small fee, and the staff do turn people away.
Shoes off inside the shrines.
The monkeys are the practical problem. Long-tailed macaques live on the steps in numbers and they are habituated, confident and quick. They will take a plastic bag, a drink, a phone or a camera from your hand.
- Carry nothing loose and nothing in a bag they can see through.
- Do not feed them. Feeding is what created the problem.
- Do not make eye contact or bare your teeth, both of which read as threats.
- If one grabs something, let it go.
Getting there
KTM Komuter from KL Sentral to Batu Caves, the end of the line, about thirty minutes and very cheap. Trains are roughly every half hour and the station is a two-minute walk from the steps.
This is much the best way. A Grab is faster in light traffic and there is rarely light traffic.
Practical
Free to enter the site and climb to the Temple Cave. The Ramayana and Dark Caves charge separately.
272 steps, steep, in heat and humidity, with no shade for most of it. There is a handrail. Take water and take your time; people do get into difficulty.
Allow half a day including the journey.
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