Kanazawa, Japan

Kanazawa highlights

Kenroku-en Garden
Higashi-Chaya District

Why visit Kanazawa

For a castle town dating to the Edo period with preserved geisha districts and one of the best gardens in Japan.

Getting there and around

After visiting Tokyo, it was time to see some other regions in Japan. We travelled by rail, and for this we purchased 14 day Japan Rail passes.

There are two classes of train carriages in Japan - ‘ordinary’ and ‘green’. Tickets for green cars are more expensive and so they can be less crowded. Seats in green cars have marginally more space.

At the time of purchasing our ‘ordinary’ 14 day JR passes cost 52,960 yen (£300) for adults and 26,380 yen (£150) for children. This worked out at only £21 per adult and £10.50 per child, per day.

Price increases are due to come in from October 2023 which will see the cost of the JR passes almost double. It’s strongly advised to use one of the many online price calculators to decide whether it is worth purchasing a pass or better value for money to buy separate tickets. Unless one is taking many long distance train journeys the new cost of a JR pass is unlikely to pay off.

We bought our passes online using the JR website which:

1. helped us to spread the cost of our trip to Japan before we travelled and

2. entitled us to make seat reservations online and in advance.

We collected the paper copies of our JR passes from Narita Airport when we first arrived in Japan. At the ticket desk we had to show our purchase confirmation and our passports. We used these paper passes in the ticket gates across Japan.

We then relied on the digital copies of our seat reservations on the JR website rather than printing them out. No staff asked to see our seat reservations on any of the trains we took.

Before leaving Tokyo, our hotel helped us to forward our luggage so we only had to take small daypacks on the train to Kanazawa. More on this below.

To get to Kanazawa from Tokyo we first took the Ginza subway line from Asakusa to Ueno station.

We then took the Hokuriku Shinkansen (bullet train) from Ueno to Kanazawa which took 2 hours 45 minutes.

Taking the bullet train was something we’d really been looking forward to and one reason we chose to visit Japan. We love travelling by train as it’s usually comfortable, quick, and doesn’t entail long security and check-in queues!

The Shinkansen had very comfortable seats which, even when the seat in front was reclined, had lots of leg room. There were charging sockets, arm rests and tables for every seat.

To get around Kanazawa we walked or we used the convenient loop bus that links all the main tourist sites together. Our accommodation was about 20 minutes from the station by bus.

Our SUICA cards that we had purchased in Tokyo worked on this bus. The bus costs 200 yen (about £1.80 per journey, 90p for children). They were easy to top up with credit at any convenience store.

Before leaving Tokyo, our hotel helped us to complete the form to use a luggage forwarding service to send our 2 big backpacks from Tokyo to Kyoto, keeping just a small bag each for Kanazawa. This meant we could avoid the hassle of taking large luggage on the Shinkansen and made moving from Tokyo to Kanazawa really easy.

The luggage forwarding service is absolutely amazing and makes like much easier for tourists travelling between different cities. It costs about £10-£15 per bag depending on the size and weight of your bag and how far it is being sent.

Accommodation

We stayed for 2 nights at K’s House in the Shintatemachi area of Kanazawa. K’s House was a warm and welcoming hostel located just a short bus ride to Kenroku-en garden.

We reserved the hostel’s ‘special Japanese room’. This room is a self contained apartment located on the top floor of the hostel (accessible by lift if needed). It consisted of two rooms with traditional Japanese tatami mats and futons for sleeping. The apartment also had a kitchen, dressing area and bathroom with jacuzzi onsen bathtub.

We paid £130 per night which felt like very good value. We loved the traditional layout, decor and furnishings of this room. It was one of the most interesting and individual places we have stayed during our travels. The hosts were friendly and very helpful too.

Our star rating: 4

Our cost rating: 5

Kenroku-en garden

A short 10 minute bus ride or 15 minute walk from our accommodation, Kenroku-en used to be the outer garden to the castle and opened to the public in 1871. The diversity of planting provides interest throughout the seasons. The garden was beautifully laid out with bridges, rock gardens, sculptures, tea houses and ponds. The planting was really special and artfully done.

Higashi-Chaya District

A chaya is a tea house where guests are entertained by geisha who sing and dance. During the Edo period many Japanese cities had these teahouses located in districts just outside of the castle or main city walls. Kanazawa has three preserved chaya districts: Higashi, Nishi and Kazuemachi.

Higashi Chaya, a short 15 minute walk from the castle and gardens, is the largest of the three districts and has tea houses open to the public. Many of the other buildings are now cafes and shops.

We paid about 5 pounds to visit Shima House, a preserved tea house where geisha conducted tea ceremonies and entertained guests.

We ate a delicious lunch of soba noodle in soup topped with tempura vegetables and tofu.

It was really lovely to walk around this area taking in the Edo era architecture, imagining what it might have been like to live there 150 years ago, and admiring beautiful people dressed in Kimono.

Final thoughts

Perhaps because it has a smaller resident population than Tokyo, the tourists in Kanazawa felt more noticeable and present, especially as there were a number of tour groups from coach trips visiting.

We visited after the peak cherry blossom season, when it must have felt intensely busy! We were lucky that some Sakura was still in bloom and despite feeling more touristy, Kanazawa was a very pleasant place to visit.

We only had 2 nights in Kanazawa which gave us just 1 full day to explore. The city was a mix of old and modern and the historic chaya district was interesting and beautiful to stroll through. We really enjoyed the garden and could see why this is heralded as one of Japan’s best.

If we had more time we would have visited the castle itself and the 21st century museum of modern art.