The morning started like so many mornings, getting up, some exercise, porridge for breakfast and packing my stuff up. The plan was to check out Omicho Market, the famous fish market in Kanazawa, also called "Kanazawa's Kitchen" and operational since 1721 boasting close to 200 shops and restaurants.
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| Market traders were getting ready for the day, laying out their produce. |
For some reason I didn't make it here back in 2009 so there was every reason not to miss in now. I left the hostel with my backpacked packed around 8.30, probably a little early for Omicho Market which tends to get active from around 10am onwards. Oh well, time for some coffee at nearby Starbucks.
I used the time to complain to the hostel management and send them some more design suggestions on improving access to their bunk beds, which is such a health & safety nightmare as it is. This made me also write to AirBnB as I feel that unsafe accommodations don't need to be accepted anymore, especially in a tightly regulated sector where taking shortcuts for pure financial gain is no longer acceptable.
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| Lots of fresh mushrooms of all varieties. |
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| Crab and shrimps. Some big crab went for as much as $150! |
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| There was also lots of fresh fruit everywhere. It was really hard not to want to buy everything. |
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| And of course a large selection of fish of all kinds. |
After a little bit of light emailing I ventured across the road. I locked my bike on the street, in the hope that other bikes left and right to mine would be a good indication that it's a designated bicycle parking area. Omicho market was literally just waking up. Many of the stall owners were busy packing their produce onto their stalls and there were no tourists yet. a few local people were already busy shopping for their own kitchens or for their restaurants. There were some whole-sellers, with unassuming looking shops and stalls and then there were more pretty-looking, well laid-out and surely tourist-focused shops and stalls. The sheer amount of fresh vegetables, fruits and of course fish was astonishing. Everything looked so tasty and the many fresh seafood dishes like grilled fish, scallops and fish oysters were really inviting. There were also a couple of restaurants from sushi to ramen to localised speciality foodstuff. I knew exactly where I was going to have lunch: its sushi time!
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| Waiting in line for the sushi restaurant, which operated a tight ticket system. |
After lunch I stopped by Starbucks again, read some more in Ray Dalio's "Principles" and continued my note-taking. I checked the train schedule and picked a train in the next hour to continue my journey to Kyoto, some 2h by Shinkansen.
It was time to return the bike, which was a real bonus in Kanazawa. I don't think I would have been able to discover so much without it. It's also an excellent way to get lost and to randomly discover local areas a bit more than just to walk around, which can be really tiring, especially with a heavy backpack on.
I arrived at Kanazawa Station around 1pm to catch the train to Kyoto, where I would also meet with my brother and his girlfriend. It's their first time in Japan and we all decided to do a bit of sightseeing and to make the most of our 1-week Japan Railpass (£220 for 7-days of unrestricted Japan Railway travelling, including all bullet trains). The journey in the Shinkansen was much less comfortable than the one from Tokyo --> Kanazawa, mainly because the train was much older, slower and the seats were a little less comfortable. In any case, the journey passed really quickly as I continued reading some more and also had a bit of a snooze. It's so easy to coordinate things nowadays with mobile-Wifi and mobile phones. We were all to arrive in Kyoto within 30min of each other, so I'd wait and hang out near Kyoto Station.
We all went to our accommodation (private AirbBnB and hostel) in the Kawaramachi District, a shopping district and close to a lot of museums, the royal palace, Kyoto Castle and also the Gaisha District, with Edo-period streets and houses. We took a taxi from the station, something I'd never do because taxi's are usually expensive but with 3 people sharing, the headache of lugging your stuff half-way through town is not so appealing and a comfy ride ever more so.
We dumped our stuff and met up for dinner. The choice of restaurants is sheer overwhelming. From traditional Japanese Ramen, Seafood, Sushi places to Western-style restaurants. We've also been making preparations for the looming Typhoon Hagibis, the strongest typhoon to hit Japan in 60 years. Our travel planning was fortunate in that we avoided the main storm by locating ourselves 450km away from Tokyo. We were only ever to get some rain and wind but nothing compared to where the typhoon made landfall, leading to mass destruction, nearly 40 people dead and over 100 people injured.
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| It wasn't quite clear where the typhoon would make landfall. We were lucky we went further South, essentially avoiding all of it and just having 2 days with rain and wind. |
We spent the evening walking around the old Gaisha district with its Edo-period houses and streets before returning to our accommodation. We walked a good 3-4km that evening and decided we would visit Osaka in the morning, getting us even further away from the typhoon and also meeting top with my friend Taiga, who I'd met in Sapporo the year before. I was really excited to meet Taiga again as we had a great time in Sapporo and the invitation to come and visit if I was ever in Osaka being honoured!
