From Tokyo we traveled by Shinkansen train to the city of Kanazawa, the capital of Ishikawa prefecture. There is a lot here to like. Because Kanazawa did not have any significant military targets, it was spared from Allied bombing during WWII. As a result, it has some very well-preserved Geisha and Samurai districts, which really set it apart as a cultural destination.
Kanazawa is also Japan’s gold-leaf production center. They’ll slap gold leaf on just about anything—statues, tea sets, decorative plates, even gilded golf balls are a popular souvenir here. Something else that is unique is that you can get a gold-leaf to coat your ice cream cone. The sheet of gold leaf is edible, although why anyone would want to eat it I can’t guess. Regular ice cream for me, please!
On our first night here, we decided to just walk around and get our bearings. Our hotel is very near most of the main attractions, so we started by checking out the Oyama Shrine.
This shrine was originally built someplace else in 1599 in honor of Maeda Toshiie but was moved to its current location in 1873. Its main gate is very different from other shrines. Built in 1875 it uses stained glass in the upper story windows and combines Japanese, Chinese, and European architecture. You can see the European-style tower framed by the torii gate in this photo.
From the shrine we walked to the nearby castle gardens.
We didn’t bother paying for admission to the castle because there isn’t really a castle there yet! The stronghold of the Maeda family for fourteen generations, the main structure has burned down several times over the centuries. When the residential part burned down again in 1881 it was just never rebuilt. Until now -— the palace is currently being reconstructed. Ground was broken last year to rebuild the heart of the castle, the Ni-no-maru palace. They began by constructing an enormous tent covering so that work can continue through the winter and rainy seasons. But as of today, the tent just covers a big empty space. Nothing to see here!
Most of the castle’s watchtowers, gates, and storehouses have already been rebuilt or restored, so at least we were able to see those and imagine what the larger castle complex would be like.
These are the doors at the castle's Ishikawa Gate, which is considered to be an original part of the castle, not a reconstruction. It's one of Japan's "Important Cultural Properties" although technically it really isn't original. The actual original gate burned down in a fire and this one was rebuilt in 1788, but I guess being 240 years old is original enough.
The castle grounds are particularly beautiful at sunset. If you squint, the reconstructed Hashizume-mon Gate in the distance does look at least a little bit like a castle, right?
During the Edo period, the Maeda clan grew very wealthy thanks to rice production on the lands they owned. Their wealth and prestige made them a potential rival to the Tokugawa clan, who were the rulers at that time. Back in those days, the Shogun kept the daimyo lords in check by ensuring that they could not gather too much power in their domains. Buildings in daimyo possession could only be three stories high maximum, and it was treasonous for Lord Maeda to build fortifications in case he used them to rise up against the shogun. But Maeda Toshiune was clever. In 1643 he moved the Myouryuji Temple in Kanazawa a short distance from his castle. Under the guise of moving it, he redesigned it with hidden staircases, spyholes, pitfall traps, a paper staircase where his guards could stab any intruders, and a well with a built-in escape tunnel halfway down the well shaft. Nowadays it has the nickname of “The Ninja Temple” due to all the tricky design features. It’s quite a building and we booked a guided tour to see all the hidden features (no photos, of course, too bad!). From the outside you would think it was just any ordinary temple.
We are surprised that there still seem to be several varieties of cherry trees that are still in full bloom. This one with the double blossoms is called Kanzan or Sekiyama. It might just be my favorite type of cherry blossom. (Who am I kidding? They are all my favorites!)
After the “Ninja” temple, we walked around the Nishi Chaya Geisha district. This is one of three Geisha entertainment districts in Kanazawa. The buildings here are charming, and there are several traditional geisha tea houses, while other buildings are preserved as museums.
We stopped into the Nishi-Chaya Museum. It was free to enter and staffed by local community volunteers. The second floor of the museum showed what a Geisha tearoom/entertainment room might’ve looked like, with a low table for serving tea and sake, and musical instruments for performances.
We spent the rest of the afternoon at the sensational Kenrokuen Garden. This is one of Japan’s three treasured gardens and it is very deserving of that status. One of the symbols of this garden is the Kotoji two-legged lantern. There was a little bit of a queue to take photos of the lake with the lantern.
But this atmospheric stone pagoda at the top of a moss-covered hill? No line!
The Kenrokuen Garden has over 1000 pine trees that have been meticulously hand-sculpted annually for over 200 years. Each autumn, teams of gardeners pluck off old pine needles from the branches by hand. Then they cut off any unnecessary branches to give the pines the desired dramatic shape. But when winter comes, these manipulated branches are prone to breaking under the heavy snow. So from November to March the gardeners erect large rope structures called yukisuri that take the weight of the snow instead of the trees. It’s very labor intensive, but the artistic silhouettes of these trees give the garden a refined and very Japanese aesthetic. (Note the pileup of Sakura "confetti" -- fallen petals from the cherry blossoms caught against the bridge.)
It was just a stunning and expansive garden. We spent a few hours there and could have happily stayed longer and had tea in one of the tea houses, or just sat on one of the benches and spent more time admiring the skill and effort it takes to maintain a garden of this scope and size.
But we had to go back to the hotel and get cleaned up for an evening of Geisha entertainment at the Kaikaro Tea House. This tea house is in Kanazawa’s Higashi Chaya district (“higashi” means “east” and “chaya” means “tea”). Geisha districts are also known as “hanamachi” or flower towns because flowers symbolize the beauty and artistry of the Geisha. The scattered districts that exist in just a few Japanese cities (Kyoto, Kanazawa, Niigata, and a few others) are all that remain of a once vibrant cultural tradition of professional entertainers skilled in music, dancing, conversation, and serving traditional food and drink. (Contrary to popular belief, geisha are not courtesans.) In the 1920s there were nearly 80,000 professional geisha across all of Japan. Now there are maybe 1000, with the majority located in Kyoto.
Kanazawa has about three dozen Geisha that are still working today at various tea houses in the city. The Kaikaro Tea House is the largest and oldest one in town, built about 200 years ago. For the past eleven years, Kaikaro has hosted an evening show for tourists, to educate them about the Geisha tradition and give them a better understanding of this traditional form of Japanese hospitality. The emcee for the “Geisha Evenings” is the tea house’s charismatic landlady, Lady Baba.
Lady Baba is not a Geisha herself, but as the landlady she knows all the details about the inner workings of the Geisha world. Throughout the evening she described, in English, how dressing and applying makeup takes each geisha over an hour. (The hair takes less time because they wear a wig.) The makeup is white because in Edo times that acted as a natural spotlight since lighting was dim and there was no electricity. We were glad we live in a time with electric lighting because our seats were pretty far from the stage.
The two Geisha entertainers performed several dances and pieces of traditional music on ozaishiki daiko drums and shamisen (a three-stringed guitar). It takes several years of apprenticeship to become a Geisha, and even once they’ve become a full-fledged Geisha they continue to spend hours daily learning etiquette, practicing instruments, dancing, singing, and learning to prepare tea in the proper way. It’s a lifelong commitment; Lady Baba said that the oldest working Geisha in Kanazawa is 93 years old—there is no retirement age or pension.
The show ended with a couple of audience participation games. Lady Baba called up volunteers from the audience. One was just calling up anyone who wanted to try playing the daiko drum. But the other one was a sake drinking game set to music played at an increasing tempo, called “Konpire Funefune”. It was similar to rock, paper, scissors. If you don’t keep the rhythm or you do “rock” when you’re supposed to do “paper”, you lose and have to take a drink. Such a fun way to end the show! I thought the whole performance was both educational and entertaining, and it was a great way to spend an evening in Kanazawa!
Saturday morning we spent a few hours wandering around the Nagamachi Samurai District.
One of the properties you can visit was the former site of a samurai home - the Nomura-ke Residence.
It was packed with tour groups inside the house but the garden was very pretty and had a pond full of huge koi.
Something I found interesting was this box in an alcove of the home. In Edo times there was no radio. So to hear music you would’ve needed a musician on staff to play you a song. Or the cheaper option was to just keep a songbird in a box, usually a Japanese warbler (uguisu) or a finch (jushimai).
After leaving the crowded samurai house we noticed a little sign on a house across the street that said “Senda-ke Garden”. Admission was about the same price as the samurai house but there were fewer people inside. Maybe the tour groups don’t have it on the itinerary. Anyway, it was a very lovely garden. And —surprise! — it was ALSO once the residence of a former samurai, Norifume Senda.
We went through the home and into the garden where we met a man giving tours in excellent English of his former home. He is the great-grandson of Norifume Senda. He said that he and his family used to live in the traditional house but it got too cold in winter. So he built a modern home next door and opened the old family home as a museum and garden.
He talked about the various features of the garden and how they have done everything possible to keep it the way his great grandfather designed it. One of the only differences between the current garden and the 1918 photo is the size of the pine trees (which are pruned into the same way as the ones in Kenrokuen).
We enjoyed walking around the narrow lanes of the samurai district.
This is one of the best-preserved places in Japan if you want to imagine what daily life was like for the warrior class during the Edo era. A very pleasant way to spend a morning and a little less commercial than the Geisha districts or area around the castle.
We were getting hungry so we headed over to Omicho market for lunch.
This place is a combination of fish market, daily food market, and prepared foods that you can eat at the stalls. The first spot we went to served sushi. But I had to chuckle when they brought it to the table— thick slabs of rice with merely the thinnest possible slice of fish on top. Profit margins are high at this place, but at least the beers were cheap!
Kevin wanted to try oysters from one of the other stalls so I took a chance and ordered a grilled scallop. We only ordered one of each but the servings were huge and it tasted very fresh!
We made the rounds of a few minor museums after lunch. I’ve always been curious about whether we should go to a Noh theatrical performance while we’re here, but it’s been my understanding that the plays are long and almost incomprehensible for Westerners who aren’t versed in the culture. Instead we went to Kanazawa’s Noh museum, where we got to view costumes and masks and even see a few video clips of various shows. And it confirmed for me that we should probably continue to say “no” to seeing a Noh performance in person.
The 21st Century Museum of Art was right next door so we gave it a chance. And we were reminded once again that we don’t love modern art. The most interesting exhibit was an artist who created some props so that people could contort their bodies into the same poses as professional soccer photos. Very niche and weird.
Kanazawa is known for having excellent seafood, so in addition to the shellfish we tried at the Omicho Market, Kevin also found a restaurant specializing in Nogoduro (Blackthroat Sea Perch). The buttery fat content of this oceanic white fish makes it a highly sought after and sort-of-expensive-but-worth-it meal.
Kevin ordered a sashimi-style rice bowl, while I ordered my fish grilled. Both were excellent and the fish just melted in your mouth. A great meal to end our stay in this charming town.
