away from Sado, back to Niigata and on to Kanazawa

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On 4 June I was all set up with my return ticket on the jetfoil place from Ryotso to return to Niigata for onward transport. I had changed it from 11.20 to 9.25am to give myself a longer buffer to get to the station, exchange my JR rail voucher and get my actual 7 day pass. This ended giving me 2 hrs but as I had not had breakfast it was time to get something to eat as well. Which I did at 11.45am at a place on the 2^ndfloor of a building (as they often are) with a sign board downstairs at street level. Pictographic menus work for me! Then the train for the 3h40m trip to Kanazawa for my next 2 nights. The English speaking staff at the info centre were really excellent, so all I then had to do was decide what I was going to do on the next day 5 June. They had directed me to a business hotel, a Tokoyu Inn, down the street which was both close and only $50 and clean and LAN internet as most are. The rooms do not really get that much bigger the more you pay, and the capsule bathrooms rarely do! The inn I stayed at Ryotsu had really unusually a separate toilet, a room with a washbasin and the shower room next to it – actually also with a deep timber bath with square sides. Used that for a shower just for the hell of it.

I had thought of dashing down to Kenroku-en, the Big 3 garden here, before it closed but I was simply too tired. Had also decided, after advice from the info ctr people, that going half way up the Noto Hanto peninsula on JR then switching to another railway was both not very efficient and would show me little. So decided to sacrifice a day of the pass and take a $72 coach trip up the peninsula to Wajima morning market and other “sights”. I will quite possibly never get here again (like Sado) so may as well cross something else off so to speak. Could not even buy the ticket then but just show up at 7.30 for 7.50am takeoff.

I got a city bus down to the main shopping area of Korinbo and walked over to where the Kenroku-en garden was, with the remains of the castle across the road, just to check out where it was for later visit. Had a general look around there then back to the hotel. This is down the road from the luxury Hotel Nikko so decided that there would be an English-speaking restaurant there for sure (it can be frustrating if places do not really even have picture menus, let alone descriptions. So I instead did a real splurge on a $100 tasting menu at the 30^th floor restaurant there called La Plage (supposedly because it looks over to the beach). The meal – with a half bottle for $38 of Alsace’s finest Hugel reisling- therefore cost about $140 – almost 3 times my hotel cost, but that is why I stay in cheaper hotels!

The restaurant itself was quite small and at 8.30pm (despite the pls book at least 2 days in advance) I just walked into and only 5 tables of 9 or so occupied. The waiter spoke fairly good English which was great as he was able to recite the dishes as they arrived. Before the menu food started there was a peach soup (in a cocktail glass). Then a seafood bavarois in a glass with a little tomato on the side with some diced caprese cheese (the Japanese find the “r” sound quite difficult so I gave the waitress some coaching). Then a further starter not on menu – some cooked rare cold Noto beef on a salad which the waitress hand dressed in a black steel bowl then transferred to a fairly ornamental glass bowl – which made it not the easiest to eat from. Then a carpaccio of shrimp and rock trout with a fennel/vinegar sauce. Then soft roe of Fugu fish (is this to give you a thrill? as fugu is of course deadly poisonous and has to be prepared by licensed people – maybe the only time I will have anything approaching it) wrapped with a pate brick (like fried spring roll) with nori. Then pan-fried willow rockfish with roasted swordtip squid with Serrano ham/shallot sauce (which did not add a lot). Then a little slab of butter soft beef fillet from Shikoku with truffle sauce. Now all of these ingredients are top-notch and preparation was good – but I would have to say there were no dishes here with any actual WOW flavor which opened your taste buds to a wild new world. The menu went on up to $250, with even less description of what you were going to get other than seasonal etc – maybe more to impress the partner/business associate with your spending power I think. Anyway desserts were two: blood orange sorbet with white chocolate panacotta thyme flavor. Then cherry compote with red wine and sweet chocolate ice cream. Then an espresso – then another as there was a plate of five different petit fours (I only ate 3 – really!). So that’s the high life/la dolce vita (on the 30^th floor with a very good night view of the city). I spent $100 a night on 2 meals (including 2 glasses of wine) in Canberra so this is not Rockpool off the scale. The chef is apparently Hideoki Jin and no idea whether he has also trained in France etc or has just made it all up. Good, but not great is my verdict.

And those espressi no doubt resulted in my worst night’s sleep ever for early start for Wajima tour bus.

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Photos

Kanazawa La Plage with a night time view
of the beach?

panfried rockfish & squid
with world's smallest asparagus underneath!