Bachwig travellers: A rainy day in Kanazawa

Day 10 - A rainy day in Kanazawa

Kanazawa

Monday, 7 July 2014

We had a lazy start to the day, enjoying the space and style of the Hotel room. We headed down to Curio cafe around 11.00 for a late breakfast. Apparently they change where they buy their pastries from but the went to the same place as the previous day because they knew we were coming back! So more fabulous coffee, banana bread and pastries. We had intended to go ther for our final morning..but they are closed. But they told us where to find a coffee stand near the train that we could get a good coffee from and Yuko said she would e mail Tommo at Blue Monday

We had intended to go to the museum of contemporary art but then discovered it was closed on Mindays! Bummer..because otherwise we would have organised our days differently!

So we headed off to Omnicho market and that was pretty fantastic. Heaps of seafood, some amazing fruit and some flowers.you can tell it is all fresh because there was no fish smell. We went for a wee shop in the mail next door to the hotel and Michael found his watch..plus it was on sale! From here we went down to see a temple past the cafe (in the rain!) and walked down to the train station, and went to pick up our train reservations for the next day (because we had had to sit separately on part of the last run). We decided to go an explore the Samurai area which I have to say that Kanazawa makes a big think in it's PR photos but it is one street..if that! They really need to tidy up their general architecture..it is very very ugly beyond the old areas. We stumbled upon an old Samurai house and had a wee look through that and it had a very spectacular garden.

During the day we got an e mail from our Ryokan in Miyajima saying that the weather was looking pretty bad including a typhoon and did we really want to come! We decided we needed to do some research on this typhoon!

When we were walking back our we came across a couple of interesting more modern buildings..and then game to the edge of the gardens and found the shrine that Sol had told us about with the interesting building with stained glass. This shrine also has a lovely garden and some really interesting sculptures of Chrysanthanums. We didn't explore all the gardens..sore feat again!

Bruce and Michael went off for a wee donut fix while I went down to the food hall in the mall to pick up some wine..and time for some more chill out ...and to do typhoon research! We decided it was a real threat and if it arrive when it should would hit in day two of our Miyajima time. We had intended to spend two nights on Miyajima and day trip to Hiroshima to see the peace park but after a bit of research we decided staying in Hiroshima in a really solid building might be better! I had remembered that Hiroshima hadn't inspired me for hotel choice at our price point but I managed to secure a good size room at the sheraton for a very reasonable price. These hotel booking sites are always frustrating it you are booking for three as you never knew what they are going to charge for an extra bed. Bookings done..dinner time. As I have been writing this I think we skipped lunch as we started the day so late!

This night was out one bad choice for dinner (I'm writing this a week later and it's still true). We had decided to have sushi as we were in Kanazawa who has access to such great seafood. We thought that the place we were eyeing up was too expensive (in retrospect we should have gone there) and ended up going to a place that was open in the market. It was pretty a pretty ropey meal! But no kne got sick..just not a pleasant meal.

	Omicho Marker [Map]		Omicho market [Map]
	Omicho market [Map]		Omicho market [Map]
	Little pottles of salad at the market [Map]		Crabs at the market [Map]
	Market fruit [Map]		A few flower stores [Map]
	View through the market [Map]		Local temple [Map]
	Photo 1 [Map]		Kids who just left the kindy attached to the templ [Map]
	Samurai area [Map]		Photo 2 [Map]
	A Jesus statue ( I think) [Map]		A church [Map]
	Modern building. [Map]		Another interesting piece of architecture [Map]
	Photo 3 [Map]		Photo 4 [Map]
	Photo 5 [Map]		Photo 6 [Map]
	Photo 7 [Map]		Photo 8 [Map]
	Photo 9 [Map]		View of the Sea of Japan from the 16th floor of th [Map]