Ten to fifteen minutes on foot: that's all that separates the gangway from Otaru's famous canal, and that proximity changes everything. On the west coast of Hokkaido, the former great herring-trade port welcomes ships practically at the foot of its historic district, so the port call unfolds with no motorcoach and no lineups. You come ashore, you walk, and early 20th-century Japan appears along the water.

The canal and its stone warehouses

Dug to serve merchant ships, the canal now lines up its old stone and brick warehouses converted into restaurants, galleries and breweries. The promenade alongside it is a must on any visit; narrated cruises of about forty minutes offer a different perspective, right at water level. The guides recount the era when cargoes went straight from the ships to the warehouses, when the city ranked among the financial centres of northern Japan. Early in the morning, before the crowds, the still water reflects the façades and the old lanterns, and you understand why this setting is among the most photographed in northern Japan. Gulls punctuate the scene with their cries, the only sounds to disturb the neighbourhood's calm at that hour.

Sakaimachi, the street of a thousand shop windows

Five minutes from the canal begins Sakaimachi Street, the commercial backbone of the old quarter. Its Taisho-era buildings house glassblowers, music box makers, pastry shops and sake houses. Otaru glass, a legacy of the days when fishing floats and ship's lamps were made here, comes in objects of every size; the music box museum, with its steam clock, adds a nostalgic note to the stroll. Allow an hour or two, longer if the shop windows draw you in.

The city of a hundred sushi counters

The port boasts more than a hundred sushi restaurants, supplied every morning by the local fish auctions. Sea urchin, Hokkaido scallops, crab and salmon make up assortments of a freshness hard to match elsewhere; counters downtown also serve rice bowls topped with seafood that make a perfect meal between stops. The old mansions of the herring shipowners, open to visitors, recall the origin of this abundance.

Walking with no program

One of the pleasures here is leaving the busy streets for the sloping lanes that climb toward the residential neighbourhoods: wooden houses, mossy stairways, cats asleep on low walls and glimpses of the harbour between rooftops. On the way back down, you almost always stumble upon a pastry shop or a coffee roaster set in a century-old building. The city lends itself to this aimless wandering, map folded away in your pocket, with the ship's gangway never far away.

Sapporo, a train ride away

Those who want to see the big city can take the JR line: rapid trains link Otaru to Sapporo in about thirty minutes along the coast. Hokkaido's metropolis then unfolds its avenues, parks and food scene. The round trip combines easily with half a day in the historic district, as long as you keep an eye on the all-aboard time.

What Otaru whispers

When it's time to head back to the pier, many slow their pace for one last look at the row of warehouses. It has managed to turn its merchant past into a gentle way of life without freezing it under glass: shops occupy the original walls, sushi carries on the tradition of the fish auctions, and the canal continues to reflect passing life. A port call that proves a port can age with elegance.