Destination Tokyo: Castle and Kenrokuen

Today we visited the gardens of Kenrokuen, stopping first at Kanazawa Castle, a samurai stronghold from the 16th century situated across the street.

We entered the castle through the Ishikawamon Gate, after taking a bridge over the road that separates the gardens from the castle complex. Like most feudal fortresses, the castle is built atop a mound whose slopes are cased in large stones, giving it a commanding position above the surrounding environment. As we entered this imposing fortress, we admired the timber framed architecture which mainly does without nails. This gate brought us into the first enclosure, where we saw the impressive fortress buildings on the edge of the second enclosure, which is also surrounded by a moat. We next visited the Kahokumen Gate on the south side of the complex. Here we had the opportunity to enter the second floor of the gatehouse (after removing our shoes of course) which gave us more close up views of the timber framing characteristic to this hemisphere. Here we saw the rare use of nails, which, unlike their western counterparts, are not designed to be removed after being used. This is accomplished by designing the head of the nail as a hollow cylinder, which is smashed flat when struck. The nail itself is also shaped as a square rather then a cylinder.

We next walked along the moat on the east side of the fortress, which brought us into the center. The complex has a surprisingly large amount of open space, and the chief buildings we saw were actually fairly thin, functioning as walls. During our exploration of this castle we read about several great destructive fires in the history of the fortress, so perhaps the abundance of empty space is a comcomitant result of these conflagrations.

Our visit ended with a stroll through the north of the complex which is occupied by a park containing dense foliage as well as an empty parapet which once contained a storeroom for the castle.

Exiting this stronghold brought us to the famous gardens of Kenrokuen, which are covered with moss and contain many venerable trees whose reaching limbs are supported by poles. Our stroll through this picturesque environment brought us past many small stone shrines, which reminded us of those we saw in the smaller gardens in Naritasan, as well as around several koi-filled lakes and over a few arched bridges. The gardens are also home to a large statue of a hero of Japanese mythology named Prince Yamato Takeru, which was erected in 1880 to honor the deaths of Ishikawa warriors who suppressed a rebellion in 1877 (Ishikawa is the name of the prefecture containing Kanazawa).

We finished our day by finding a place to eat lunch before walking back to our Airbnb, where we relaxed for the rest of the day after our early jet lag induced start this morning.
-Theodore

The author and Nathaniel in front of a tower beside the main gate.

An example of the nail-less timber frame construction used throughout the castle.

Maryrose and Nathaniel in front of buildings along the west side of the second enclosure.

Maryrose and the author in front of these buildings, with the moat visible. We have in hand our genuine Japanese umbrellas which we ended up not needing despite an overcast start to the day.