Aomori Nebuta Matsuri

Aomori Nebuta is the most spectacular of the Tohoku summer festivals. Its floats are enormous paper lanterns, painted with warriors, gods and beasts from legend and lit from within, mounted on wheeled frames and pushed through the streets by teams of men. Around each float hundreds of haneto dancers in flowered hats leap and shout "rassera", and the sound of drums and flutes carries across the whole city centre. Anyone in the correct costume, available to rent from shops around town, may join the dancers.

The festival runs from 2 to 7 August. From the 2nd to the 6th the floats parade after dark, from 19:00, around the loop of Shinmachi-dori and Hakko-dori. On the 7th the floats go out by day, and then, from about 19:15, the prize-winning floats are loaded onto barges and towed across the harbour at Aomori Port while fireworks are launched over the water. That closing night is the single most memorable image of the festival, and it needs a spot on the waterfront claimed well ahead.

Aomori is reached by shinkansen from Tokyo via Shin-Aomori, and the parade course is a walk from Aomori Station. Accommodation in the city sells out months ahead; Hirosaki and Hachinohe make workable bases by train. The parade route has free standing room along the whole loop, with paid seats at the busiest corners. Expect warm nights, dense crowds and an atmosphere closer to a carnival than a shrine rite.