Numata Yotaka Andon Festival

Posted on September 17, 2010 by Charles Hamel in Hokkaido, Japan, Life in Japan, Travel | No Comments

andon4-1

A few weeks back the family and I traveled about an hour and 30 minutes to the small town of Numata in Hokkaido Japan to take part in the Numata Yotaka Andon Festival. This was the first time my family members had seen this festival and my second year in a row to attend. The festival didn’t disappoint as expected. The Numata Yotaka Andon Festival is one of the top 5 biggest festivals on the far northern island of Hokkaido. (日本語: 北海道沼田町の夜高あんどん祭の模様)

andon01-1

I attended the Numata Yotaka Andon festival last year after taking a photography class at the Numata Kominkan, so I kind of knew what to expect, unfortunately I couldn’t take part in the adult beverages last year because I had to drive back home, but this year we decided to camp out in the van, so party mode was on. The wife was very impressed and had a wonderful time while accepting free sake from the floats that passed by. My kids also enjoyed the festival, for the sites the sweets and the toys.

andon0-1

A little information about the Numata Yotaka Andon Festival. The festival was introduced by Kizaburo Numata, the town’s founder, from his hometown of Oyabe, Toyama Prefecture, in 1977. “Andon” is another way of calling “chochin” or paper lanterns, but the andon used for this festival are gigantic being as large as 7 meters (23ft) tall, 11 meters (37ft) wide and 5 tons heavy – which may rather be called a dashi (float). It is one of the Three Great Andon Festivals of Hokkaido, and is also the only “kenka-andon” or the “fighting-andon” in the prefecture. By this, the term describes a kind of festival where more than ten andon (which again, are more like dashi) goes around the city ending up crashing into each other at the climax. The festival commemorates its 30th anniversary this year and on the 24th, all three greatest andons of Hokkaido get together allowing the audience to see three of them at once.

andon1-1

When the festival was winding down we had sat down on the curb to watch the final fireworks display and grab a bite to eat when from behind me I heard someone say “Hey Charlie”, turning around to see where the perfect English had come from, my good friend Snowman and his lovely wife were standing behind me. Snowman had is Canon Eos in one hand and his HD Video Camera in his other with both full of great shots.

andon2-1

I caught a few good shots myself as you can see in this post. All in all it was a great night out with the family and lots of fun. I can’t wait until next year to do it again, which will be a anniversary year for the festival and no doubt special things in store. If you are in the area , I highly recommend the Numata Yoyaka Andon Festival for a must see.