Picnic allowed in Kenroku-en?

Hello,

My wife and I will be visiting Kenroku-en this November. To cut back on costs, we were thinking of buying a takeaway bento for lunch, and then eating it as a picnic inside Kenroku-en. But, knowing that this is a formal garden setting, we weren't sure if this is permitted. If anyone could help us, it would be much appreciated!

Have a nice day :)

There are very very few seats in Kenrokuen, and no rubbish bins to my memory (trash cans) but there are lawn areas where I have seen people sitting & resting...cant remember if they were eating or not.. There are food stalls on the path up to the main entrance. So I think it may be OK, so long as it hasn't recently rained, (!) and you take all trash away with you.
Enjoy...it is sublime. We will be there for the 3rd time in 10 days....

The official Japanese and English websites published by Ishikawa Prefecture don't mention anything about eating or drinking in the park, but the FAQ on the Kenrokuen tourist association site says you can't - including during the hanami cherry blossom viewing season.

http://www1.ocn.ne.jp/~ken6en/faq.html

There is a tea house in the park for refreshments.

Thank you both for your responses! While of course we would have taken all of our waste with us, now that we know that eating is not permitted inside the garden, we will eat quickly at the station upon arrival.
Happy wanderings to you both :)

Save some room for the dango (sp?) there. It is the best we've had anywhere in Japan. The kiosk is inside the park. There are also some nice restaurants around the outside.

We've just come back from Kanazawa, and visited Kenrokuen.

You might want to consider:
(1) sticking with the picnic option but eating it in the grassed area which surrounds the 21st Century Contemprorary Art Museum. The museum is right by the entrance to Kenrokuen, and is surrounded by a large grassed area with seats and benches, as well as some amusing sculpture. It's a fantastic museum, and well worth a look (even if you only go to the free stuff in the outer rooms - like the James Turrell room, for instance, which is worth 5 minutes of anyone's time).

(2) I know you're thinking about having a picnic to save cash, but you might reconsider given that Kanazawa is a really great city for food, and that Omicho Market is 5-10 minutes walk from Kenrokuen and offers a great range of fantastic lunch options (including noodles and Kaiten sushi, which one would expect to be cheap). The market is fantastic just to browse. It's packed with fish stalls (as well as all sorts of other foods), and quite a few of them sell pre-prepared sushi/sashimi boxes which are ready to take away and eat.

We treated ourselves to excellent chirashi sushi, which was better value for money than anything we could find in Tokyo or Kyoto. It was (if I remember correctly) about JPY2,500 each, but we were pushing the boat out and I can't stress how fresh it was and what a wide variety of the more expensive fish was included. In the same restaurant, we could have had a range of other sashimi/tempura donburis at prices starting from circa JPY 800, which isn't exactly expensive.

It's an easy walk from Omicho to Kenrokuen, passing by the outer walls of the castle park, which is very scenic.

I love Kanazawa.