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Published: September 8th 2011
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The train journey was relatively short in comparison to our previous ones which was a pleasant change …but in true travelling style, well, I should say mine and James travelling style, we still did not get to the Kanazawa till late afternoon. We had heard of a good hotel that was recommended on the typical backpackers grape vine called Pongi’s. We turned up during Pongi’s siesta time (but we did however persuade another backpacker to let us in to drop our stuff off so that we could explore and check in later on.
So off to explore, the best thing about travelling is the exploring, being put in a new town walking down a new street, with wide eyes and taking it all in with the desire not to take out the lonely planet book to check reference everything and then you get lost in a new wonderful town. Kanazawa was a cute town, to get into the main centre you walked by the canal. The walk was mixed with samurai houses, cobbled streets, old traditional homes jumbled with tarmac roads and Japan’s versions of housing estates. This is beautiful until you get to the city hub where the landscape
is dominated by slightly dirty high rises.
With no camera in hand, as mine was on its last legs and James’s camera had no power we explored Kanazawa castle. Kanazawa was a samurai town and the castle was owned by the Maeda clan. We only explored the grounds and the parts of the gardens that we could visit without spending any entrance fees. We had seen a few castle by now and as we had to get back to sign in at Pongi’s we gave it a miss but after looking at the images on the net, we probably should of gone back, but I could say that about a load of places.
Pongi was a lovely, enthusiastic retired Buddhist he couldn’t of made us more welcome, into his own home which he had turned into a hostel, the hostel was probably a bit too much like someone home and therefore we were slightly more uncomfortable. When we got back to the hostel Pongi was talking to a backpacker was had just climbed Mt Fuji, but he was saying that he just did it in time as they have closed down the tourist tracks. My aim of climbing
Mt Fuji is not looking good, so we had a bit of chat before Pongi official signed us in. Pongi then invited us to kneel down and he went through the maps and the tourist attractions and the best eateries Kanazawa had to offer. We then had a grand tour and were introduced to out flat mates for the next two nights. We settled in and then headed back out to find food for dinner. As normal the usual finding food routine occurred. We consulted the lonely planet book, but ended up deciding to be creative and explore ourselves. We headed in the direction that Pongi advised for food places, we started off quite hungry as we walked past load of potential places to eat, checking the menu out like a potential date …maybe not our cup of tea….i hope they aren’t offended after us checking it out, pulling a face and walking off, not the right ambiance…..we are consistently trying to find that prefect place to eat, thinking there is somewhere better round the corner, not willing to miss out. To make sure we can assess all possible options and at the same time we are getting hungrier and
hungrier to the point where arguments start and the decision to eat anywhere, as long as it’s somewhere. On this particular case our somewhere was where the food was rubbish, no atmosphere and rude staff. Over dinner we end up asking why we did not consult the travelling bible…but I’m sure we do it again just to be adventurous. We then went for a night walk to explore the rest of the city as a former geisha area, we expecting a bit of a nightlife I don’t know why as this is probably a social faux pas , as we headed over to the traditional centre we could see that any type of nightlife that does not include food was not going to happen. We walked round the old samurai district on our own which was nice to have it to ourselves, but it was dark and we couldn’t see too much. We then headed back to our Ryokan styled room for a kip after being quizzed by Pongi on what we were doing on our next day of exploring and when (this is scarily like being at home).
Next day we had a lovely day in the Kanazawa’s
21st Century Museum, which was uber modern and had very interesting and visually spectacular exhibitions and a joy to walk round for a morning. Lunch was probably noodles…ohh I miss the spicy noodles!! We then headed back to the Samurai district which was bustling with activity and tourists. All sort of arts and crafts were being sold, lacquered pots, pottery, porcelain, silk, gold leaf products and all other typical Japanese gifts. I did not by anything and we had no luck on spotting a geisha either! After this we headed back to the hostel and spent a very pleasant evening reading the night away.
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