Kanazawa - Day 2

Next day bright and early .... well it is Japan nothing much opens until 10. Had breakfast at one of the many eateries on ground floor of Kanazawa station. "The German Bakery", much like "Donq" and other Japanese bakeries, it is self service to browse and choose from the isles of pastries on offer, then take your tray to the counter to get order a drink and pay. Range includes chocolate croissants, fruit in pastry, hotdog roll with sauce and sausage baked into it, and various pastries that incorporate green tea or bean paste, and the surprise at this one was southern fried chicken.



First stop was the Ninja house, this is a temple with hidden floors (actually 5 floors high), doors and numerous hiding places, traps and nasty surprises for an attacker. Actually has nothing to do with Ninjas but has become known as Ninja dera. You have to ring up to book into the one of the hourly tours, this seems to limit the number of English speaking tourists who make it to this place. The tour is in Japanese, but a folder is provided with the English translations for you to follow along, well worth 800 yen admission.

On the way back we walked through the Samurai housing district which have a number of open house/gardens along the way.




Wandering back through the town we found some wonderful streets with the diverted river flowing alongside the streets, in warm weather these would make great places for outdoor dining, though it doesn't look like there is such a thing available.




Went to the markets for lunch, tasted a lot samples. When tasting a samples, you present the back of your hand (fist) , they will place the food on it and you eat it off the back of your hand, they will also pass you a cloth afterwards to wipe the back of your hand. In this manner, we tried many types of marinated squid. We choose two and had later that night with Sake.



Last stop for the day was the Modern Art Gallery, it is an odd thing with art galleries in Japan that the architecture of the building seems to be promoted & described far more than the collection it houses. This building looks great from above apparently. Bought a few gifts from the gift shop, including a couple of vases made from plastic that fold flat so you can put them away when not in use.