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🏮 Hana Yu Matsuri

花湯まつり

Misasa, Tottori (Misasa Onsen Main Street) · Every year on 3 May

Mikoshi

231 days to go
Rooms around Misasa, Tottori fill up while the festival is on.

The Hanayu Festival is held every year on May 3 and 4 in Misasa Onsen (Misasa Town, Tottori Prefecture). It is a major festival centered on the rites at Misasa Shrine, the Yakushi Hall memorial service for Yakushi, and the large tug-of-war called Jinsho, designated an Important Intangible Folk Cultural Property of Japan. In Jinsho, a female rope and a male rope made by twisting wisteria vines together are pulled against each other by east and west sides in a bold traditional event. It has long been said that if the east wins there will be a good harvest, and if the west wins commerce will prosper. The wisteria ropes, rare nationwide, are huge: 80 meters long, up to 2 meters in maximum girth, and 2 tons in weight. On the 3rd there is rope twisting, and on the 4th a children's procession, a children's mikoshi (portable shrine), and fireworks upstream of Koitani Bridge take place on Misasa Onsen Main Street, with Jinsho at 8:30 p.m. bringing the festival to its climax. In the evening, after a Shinto priest purifies the area at Engimon, young men lift the two ropes and join them with a "kasegi" wooden bar. The moment the large lanterns are extinguished, people divided into east and west begin the tug-of-war at once.

Getting there

Held on Misasa Onsen Main Street. The nearest station is JR Kurayoshi Station, about 20 minutes by bus from the station. Traffic restrictions are in place during the event.