Pura Kehen banyan with the kulkul drum tower

A wooden drum tower sits in the crown of this banyan, and it was built without stairs. The priest who sounded it reached it through the roots. The tower is a bale kulkul, the slit-drum pavilion a Balinese temple beats to call people in, and here a living tree holds it up. Higher still in the branches sits a monk's cell. The banyan stands in the outer courtyard of Pura Kehen in Bangli, just past the entrance gate, and the town treats it as sacred. Local belief says a falling branch foretells disaster, which they call grubug, so a broken limb here is read as a warning, not as weather. How old it is depends on whom you ask. Wikipedia says at least 400 years; the other accounts we found say only centuries old, and nobody has dated the trunk. Take 400 as the one number on offer, not a measurement. The most recent travel and local news pages still describe it standing, but we have no dated photograph, so if you have been lately, tell us. Our pin marks the temple rather than the tree. Pura Kehen is about 25 km from Ubud, roughly 45 minutes by car or scooter through Bangli town; there is no bus worth waiting for. Expect a small donation at the gate and a sarong to wear inside.