Setsubun-sai at Gokoku-jinja
In addition to tossing out beans, rice cakes, and snacks, Gokoku Shrine's Setsubun includes ritual archery .
In addition to tossing out beans, rice cakes, and snacks, Gokoku Shrine's Setsubun includes ritual archery .
Annual mame-maki throwing out of good luck beans and other goodies to commemorate Setsubun at Sorasaya Shrine.
During the 3-day Mihara Daruma Festival the streets are taken over by stalls selling lucky daruma dolls and every kind of festival food you can imagine. The pride of Mihara is also on display, the nation's biggest daruma doll which weighs in at a couple of hundred kilograms.
The annual samurai parade through the streets of Miyajima and Itsukushima Shrine.
Onomichi gets into the Golden Week spirit, ahead of the main event with a big, but very local, festival, featuring traditional and modern dance, family-friendly events, and lots of food stalls.
The annual Kintai Bridge Festival in Iwakuni is an excellent way to kick off your Golden Week.
Ritual tea picking in traditional garb at Shukkeien Garden.
Frenetic and colorful countryside festival that involves groups of locals charging up and down a narrow street carrying huge umbrellas.
100 shrine maidens dance to soothe the souls of those lost to war and to wish for a good match at Hiroshima Gokoku Shrine. Kagura too!
Tomo Bentenjima Fireworks Festival in the quaint port town of Tomo-no-ura kicks off the years's summer's fireworks festivals!
Onomichi's retro shopping arcade gets festive on Saturdays in the run up to the summer holidays.
Mibu-no-hanadaue is a revived rice planting ritual that dates back to the Middle Ages and is reenacted on the first