Tanah Lot Temple is one of the most important and sacred temples for Balinese people.

The temple’s name is named after the rock it was built on, with “Tanah” meaning land and “Lot (lod/laut)” meaning sea. Tanah Lot is claimed to be the work of the 16th-century Dang Hyang Nirartha, who said spoke to the fishermen and told them to build a shrine on the rock for he felt it to be a holy place to worship the Balinese sea gods. The temple has been a part of Balinese mythology for centuries.

At the base of the rocky island, venomous sea snakes are believed to guard the temple from evil spirits and intruders. The temple is purportedly protected by a giant snake, which was created from Nirartha’s selendang (a type of sash) when he established the island.

In 1980, the temple’s rock face was starting to crumble and the area around and inside the temple started to become dangerous. The Japanese government lent a large sum of money to the Indonesian government to repair both the rock and the temple.

According to mornings.co.uk, they have searched and aggregated reviews on Tripadvisor to create a ranking of the most beautiful spots to watch the sunset in the world, in which Tanah Lot Temple ranks 8th with 3,265 reviews, the highest of any location in Southeast Asia.

According to Wikipedia and mornings.co.uk