One day I’m munching on red velvet cupcakes at Chanel and the next I’m channeling Jane Goodall while chasing after macaques at Batu Caves. The unpredictability of the road is by far the best part of travel. For every mind-numbing hour of trudging from one airport…

to another…

there are redemptive, rich experiences on every corner of this great big world waiting for my eyes and camera:

Batu Caves is a limestone cave just outside of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The caves complex, about 400 million years old, now serves as one of the most popular Hindu shrines in Asia. The 140-ft tall Murugan (a Hindu deity) statue, made of concrete, stands guard outside the main Temple Cave:

The 272 steps look much more daunting than they are to climb, even in very humid weather,

and worth every gallon of water that my body has lost by the time I reach the top!

There are three main caves and a few smaller ones in the complex:

At the base of the hill, there are numerous other temples and structures,

and one cave is dedicated to the epic story of Rama:

To the far side of the grounds there is also the Ramayana Cave that’s flanked by the enormous statue of Hanuman, the devotee of Lord Rama and typically depicted as having monkey features:

So why wouldn’t it make sense that there would be macaques all over the temple grounds?

On our way out, we walk through the Cave Villa,

which houses some exotic birds and reptiles. I stick around until I get this genetics lottery winner to strut his stuff:

An afternoon of monkeying around Batu Caves is already worth the 19 hours getting to Malaysia. Can’t wait to see what else is in store for me here.