Our next stop was Kanazawa on the west coast of Japan. Here, we visited the kenroku-en Gardens, said to be one of the top 3 gardens in the whole of Japan. It certainly was very beautiful, though much smaller than I'd imagined it would be - certainly nowhere near the size of, say, Kew Gardens in London. We went there in the early evening - it was one of the very few sunny times and because it was evening the gardens were not too busy. Very beautiful and peaceful.