Day 13 in Japan: A Tour of Shirakawa-go and Gokayama

April 19, 2026

Today was a leisurely day when we did not have to worry about anything because we had booked a tour. We were originally going to visit Shirakawa-go and Gokayama by ourselves, but the logistics were far too convoluted and would have involved a very unreasonable amount of time in transit. The tour was unguided. Instead of being shepherded from one site to another, the itinerary was to be driven to Shirakawa-go, spend two hours walking around, eat lunch, transit to Gokayama, spend one hour there, and return to Kanazawa late in the afternoon.

When we boarded our bus in the morning, we found that in addition to the bus driver, we would have two quasi-guides – not to lead us around but to explain the itinerary and the attractions of the places we were visiting before releasing us at our stops. One of these ladies, who announced that she had just returned from her maternity leave (a statement that was corroborated by her rusty English), did most of the talking, while the other said practically nothing. We assumed she was assessing her colleague’s performance. I cannot imagine the review was overwhelmingly positive despite the frazzled quasi-guide’s best efforts, as she was constantly pausing and rephrasing her sentences, which included gems such as “please forget your luggage and valuables on the bus” and “you can see the cherry blossoms go wooooo” with accompanying hand gestures. She ended the day having given up on brushing her hair out of her eyes, ostensibly to avoid having to make eye contact with us.

Shirakawa-go and Gokayama are UNESCO-listed villages in the remote western mountains of Honshu. They are famous for their traditional gasshō-zukuri houses built without nails and with steep roofs made of thick thatch. These roofs, resembling praying hands, are where the name “gasshō” comes from, and they employ this formidable angle to avoid breaking under the copious amounts of snow that descend on the mountains in the winter. Nowadays, the vast majority of the people living in Shirakawa-go are employed by the tourist sector in some capacity, as the picturesque area attracts a considerable number of visitors.

We had good weather in both villages and managed to explore a fair amount. In Shirakawa-go, we made a quick hike to the viewpoint over the valley, after which we walked through the town all the way to the open-air museum where some of the houses are preserved in their original state. Joel spotted a salamander in the rice-field, and we came across quite a few lizards and various beetles on the way. Gokayama was smaller and much less overwhelmed by tourists. We only spent an hour there, which was just about enough time to hit some of the main viewpoints and take a look at the most interesting houses.

Our bus returned to Kanazawa before four o’clock, giving us lots of time to spend at the Shrines of Ishiura and Hirosakainari, as well as Kenroku Garden just across the road. Kenroku-en is considered one of the “Three Great Gardens of Japan” and is named after the six attributes of a perfect garden. These attributes are understood as contrasting pairs that must find the right balance: spaciousness and seclusion, artifice and antiquity, and finally, waterways and panoramas. Kenroku-en is noted for having the oldest fountain in Japan as well as the famous Kotoji-tōrō, a stone lantern with two elegantly arched legs standing on the banks of the garden’s largest pond.