Nijo castle

If you know anything about Japanese historical architecture, there's a fair chance it will be that the risk of sneak ninja attacks led to the development of nightingale floors. These are cunningly constructed so they make an attractive but unavoidable bird-like chirrup when walked on, thus alerting the family to intruders.

Everybody knows this - it's in all the guidebooks, and countless novels. And like most things everybody knows, it's not true.

When we went around the first monastery here I noted that the floors around the outside made a quite musical squeaking noise, while those in internal corridors did not. Listening to the sound, I wondered aloud whether these were the famous nightingale floors. Derek was unconvinced, because why would a monastery expect surprise attacks?

Today on our tour of Nijo castle I spotted a small sign with some pictures of joist fixings. Most people walked straight past it - why look at a diagram of pegs and brackets when you could be admiring golden panels painted with hawks or majestic pines? But I like little details* and having just come through Russia I'm all gold-leafed out, so I read it. It explained how the floorboards are joined, and how pressure on them results in the characteristic squeak. A short sentence right at the end said the noise wasn't designed in - and wouldn't have been there when first built - it's simply a result of wear.

Even if it had been true, a couple of minutes experimentation in a deserted stretch of corridor showed that it's perfectly possible to walk on a nightingale floor without making a sound. If I can do it, a ninja would have no problem.

Having learnt about floors we went for a stroll round the gardens and found a cherry blossom viewing area that didn't have very much blossom left, but did have a stall selling cherry blossom mochi. We shared a sakura daifuku (after a brief discussion of whether or not to eat the leaf**) and a stick of hanami dango. The former is a large bun of textured, cherry blossom flavoured rice dough, stuffed with red bean paste and wrapped in a brined cherry leaf. The latter 3 small balls of smooth rice dough - 1 matcha flavoured, 1 plain and one sakura.

After lunch we wandered up to the Imperial palace. You need to apply in advance to go into the buildings but we were quite happy to just wander through the park admiring the trees and roof decorations. A parliament of rooks had descended on the lawns there to enjoy a dandelion banquet, delicately plucking the petals from the flowers.

* A few years ago I went on a trip to a famous waterfall. I came away without a single photo of it, because on the other side of the path the spray had resulted in some really interesting moss growth.

** Yes. But there's a similar one for children's day that is wrapped in an oak leaf, which is NOT edible. There is a tale of a former emperor who made himself quite ill when given one of the oak versions because - as a well brought up emperor - he'd always been taught not to leave anything on his plate.Read more