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Create an accountPrivate local guides in Kanazawa
Kanazawa is the Japan people imagine before they arrive: a samurai quarter, a geisha district, a garden that changes with every month, and mountains a short drive away. These are the locals who live there.
Most visitors give Kanazawa a day between Tokyo and Kyoto and spend it in Kenroku-en, which is fair, because the garden really is one of the three finest in the country. The city rewards a slower pace, though. Higashi Chaya still has working teahouses behind its wooden lattices, Nagamachi keeps its samurai walls and canals, Omicho market sells the crab and sweet shrimp the Sea of Japan is known for, and the contemporary art museum sits in the middle of it all as if it had always been there. Gold leaf is on the ice cream, the lacquerware and, in some old houses, the walls.
Every guide on this page is a real person with their own page, their own photos and their own idea of a good day out. You write to them directly, agree the date, the meeting point and the price between you, and pay them without anything passing through us. Ikitorii takes no commission on the time you spend together. Kanazawa is also where the road to the mountains begins, so Shirakawa-go, Gokayama, Takayama and the Noto Peninsula often come up in the first message.
Yuta Koshida
A city of crafts, tea and very good fish
Kanazawa was rich for centuries and spent the money on beauty: gold leaf, Kutani porcelain, Kaga yuzen silk, lacquer, tea ceremony, and a cuisine built on what the boats bring in each morning. A local knows which workshop will let you try, which teahouse is still run by the family, and where to eat crab in season without the tourist prices.
Shirakawa-go, the Noto coast and the road less taken
The famous villages of Shirakawa-go and Gokayama are an hour away and worth it, and so are the places the coaches skip: Inami and its woodcarvers, Hida-Furukawa's quiet canals, the Noto Peninsula's fishing villages and rice terraces. Some guides here drive as well as guide, which turns a day of connections into a day of places. Tell them what you like and let them draw the route.
How it works
Pick a guide whose page speaks to you and send them a message from Ikitorii. They answer in their own words, usually within a day, and the two of you take it from there. No booking fee, no fixed programme and nobody in the middle: just a local who wants to show you the Kanazawa they live in.