May３, 2022

Spring Fujiwara Festival

Hiraizumi was founded in the Tohoku region as a wish for a peaceful nation. In the twelfth century, Minamoto-no-Yoshitsune arrived here, fleeing his brother Yoritomo, who had established the Kamakura Shogunate, and was warmly welcomed by Fujiwara Hidehira and the local populace. Celebrating this, a parade of a hundred people march between the temples of Môtsû-ji and Chûson-ji, recreating images from Heian-period picture scrolls.

July, 2022

Opening of Mt. Fuji to Climbing

Mt. Fuji is officially opened for climbing on the Yamanashi side on July 1, and on the Shizuoka side on July 10. In the city of Fujiyoshida in Yamanashi Prefecture, the Mt. Fuji Opening Eve Festival is held the day before, on June 30, and features a parade as far as the Kitaguchi Hongu Fuji Sengen-jinja Shrine. On the Shizuoka side, a ritual to open the mountain for climbing is held at the Fujisan Hongu Sengen-taisha Shrine on July 10.

July to October, 2022

Jomon Festival 2022

A music festival, nature games, creating your own earthen figures, making fire, trying Jomon foods, lectures and more are planned to be held on the Jomon sites, which are now a World Heritage site.

August 5 to 15, 2022

Lantern and Fire Festivals in Nara

In the first half of August, some of Japan’s most important rituals take place in Nara.
Nara Tokae Lantern Festival, from August 5 to 14 (scheduled) Chugen Mantoro Lantern Festival, August 14 and 15 at Kasuga-taisha Shrine Manto Kuyoe Lantern Festival, August 15 at Tôdai-ji Temple Nara Daimonji Okuribi (Fire festival in the shape of a burning “Dai” character) at Tobihino, Mt. Takamado.

August 6, 2022

Atomic bombings of Hiroshima

Held on the night of the anniversary of the atomic bombing as a way to pray for lasting world peace. It began shortly after the end of the Second World War, when citizens and people who had lost loved ones in the war began setting hand-made lanterns floating down the river. The lights within each lantern are lit from the fires left from the atomic-bombing of Hiroshima.

October 1, 2022

Miare Festival

A sea-borne event held to mark the start of the major autumn festival of the Munakata Taisha Shrine to give thanks for national peace, good harvests, good catches, and safety at sea (held October 1 to 3). To allow the goddesses Tagori-hime, enshrined at the Okitsu-miya Shrine on Okinoshima island, and Tagitsu-hime, enshrined at Nakatsu-miya Shrine on Chikuzen Oshima island, to come to the Hetsu-miya Shrine on the Kyushu mainland where Ichikishima-hime is enshrined, a boat carrying the two goddesses is conveyed there in a flotilla of more than a hundred boats.