Japan

Held twice a year in the old town of Takayama, the Takayama Festivals (Takayama Matsuri) in Japan are rich experiences featuring large ornate floats (Yatai) which are displayed throughout the city. The spring festival, held on April 14th & 15th, is held each year to pray for a good harvest and features the Hie Shrine. The shirine is known as Sanno-sama and is why the spring festival is referred to by many as the Sanno Festival. The fall festival (Hachiman Festival), held on October 9th and 10th after the harvest, centers around the Sakurayama Hachiman Shrine and focuses on giving thanks for a good harvest. Started sometime in the 16th century, it draws hundreds of thousands of visitors each year and is one of the three largest festivals in Japan behind only Kyoto’s Gion Matsuri and the Chichibu Matsuri. The activities and attractions of both festivals are quite similar with each festival having its own set of nearly a dozen impressively decorated floats.

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The Sapporo Snow Festival is a world famous winter celebration where hundreds of massive ice sculptures are created from packed snow and shaved ice and put on display throughout the city of Sapporo, Japan. To support the festival, over 30,000 tons of snow is trucked in from the mountains and surrounding areas. The festival was established in the 1950 displaying six snow statues made by local high school students. In 1955 the festival had its first enormous snow sculpture, built by Japan’s Self Defense Force, but it didn’t hit its stride until 1972 when Sapporo hosted the Winter Olympics. The festival, one of Japan’s largest and most distinctive winter events, is held during the first full week of February every year and visited by around 2 million people from Japan and around the world.

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