Japan Part 2 - Kanazawa and Castles

Japan Part 2 – Kanazawa and Castles

The second leg of my journey was honestly my favorite part of my trip to Japan. The second leg started with three days in Kanazawa, a medium sized town on the Japanese coast about 3 hours northwest of Tokyo on a bullet train. It’s not off the beaten track, I’d say it’s on a metaphorical paved side road for tourists visiting Japan. After Kanazawa, I went to the town of Matsumoto, which is in the Japanese Alps. Matsumoto was not originally on my itinerary, but since the cherry blossoms were crazy early, I switch from going to Tohoku (northern Honshu) to visiting Matsumoto. Which turned out to be a great choice. Here are (some of) the great, the unexpected, and the random for leg two of my trip - Kanazawa and Matsumoto.

The Great

Matsumoto-Jo
This is one of the coolest things I saw in all of Japan. Matsumoto-jo aka Matsumoto Castle, is one of the five National Treasure Castles in Japan, and is also known as the Crow Castle for its black exterior. The castle was built in the late 1500s and has remained intact, even when the palace behind it burned down. There is a story that a deity protects the castle against fire. You can climb through the entire castle (no shoes allowed fyi, you have to carry them) up all six stories to the top, and then back down through the moon-viewing room. The only thing I didn’t like about the castle was the steps were very high and very narrow in width, making them nerve-wracking to go down. Although a nice Japanese woman encouraged me about making it down the worst set of ladder-stairs. You can do Matsumoto as a day trip, but I was there for a couple nights, making it more relaxing.

Beer
Far more than sake, beer is the national alcoholic drink of Japan. Like everywhere in the world there has been something of a craft beer movement in Japan, which allowed me to check out a lot of local beers beyond just Sapporo and Asahi. A lot of the 7/11s have cans of local beers you can buy, which was a great way to check out a number of things. The best beer place I visited though was Oriental Brewing, a craft brewery in Kanazawa. They had a number of different beers – my two favorites were the Noto Salt Saison and the Yuzu wheat beer (I had a number of Yuzu-flavored beers in Japan and they were always great). Oriental Brewing also had what is now one of my favorite pub-snacks I’ve had – beer-battered fried lotus root.

Staying in a Ryokan
If you go to Japan, you need to spend at least a couple nights in a ryokan, aka a traditional Japanese inn. I stayed in a ryokan, Sumiyoshiya, for three nights in Kanazawa, and it was such a great experience. The house and the rooms were beautiful. Rather than one room, it was more like a suite of little connected rooms, which was pretty cool. The furnishings were mostly traditional, with a low table and a floor-chair (a cushion with a backrest on the floor) but there were some western chairs as well. Instead of a bed, there is a futon on the floor. The breakfast I had at the ryokan was also excellent. They had the option of providing a vegetarian Japanese breakfast (although dashi was used) which was slightly different and delicious each day. It’s important to be careful of the protocol of ryokans, the most important of which is you cannot wear shoes indoors, or even slippers on tatami mats.

The Unexpected

Kanazawa’s Samurai District
Kanazawa is famous for its gardens (and deservedly so), but one of the unexpected and very cool things I saw was the Samurai District. The Samurai District is comprised of a number of old, preserved samurai houses, a preserved pharmacy, and the Maeda Shirokan Museum, which showed a number of artifacts from one of the Maeda clan branches. The district is very cool, as it’s both lovely to walk around and there are a bunch of little sites you can check out. Some of the old houses are full museums, and some just have informational placards. It’s totally worth half a day for exploring. 

Myoryu-Ji Temple – Kanazawa
The Myoryu temple is a major temple in Kanazawa and is more popularly known as the Ninja Temple, because the entire temple is full of traps and hidden rooms and secret passage ways. All of these were to help protect the head of the Maeda family – the clan that ruled the Kanazawa region during the Edo period. The temple was so very cool, with all the little details and there were a lot of interesting architectural features, like how it looked like it was fewer stories from the outside than it was, and a sliding door that lead to different floors depending on what side you slid it to. There are no pictures allowed, and the only way to visit is to take a tour that is only given in Japanese. However, they provided a giant, extremely helpful, informational package with the information in English so the English-speakers could follow along.

The Random

Gold-leaf covered food
Kanazawa is the primary producer of gold leaf for all of Japan. And by that I mean 98% of all gold leaf produced in Japan comes from Kanazawa. So naturally, this means that gold leaf can be used in food. I had soft-serve green tea and vanilla ice cream with gold leaf on it while I was at Kenrokuen Gardens, and it was interesting but weird. The only other gold leaf foods I saw were chocolates, but I didn’t try any of those.

Next up will be Part 3 – Kyoto!