Travel plans/Winter 2014

Itinerary

• Day 1

• Day 2

• Day 3

• Day 4

• Day 5

• Day 6

• Day 7

Suggested routes

Idea 1 (Mika)

Day 1: Kagoshima/Yakushima

Day 2: Nagasaki

Day 3: Beppu or Fukuoka

Day 4: Sanuki/Izumo

Day 5: Akita

Day 6: Hokkaido (floating ice tour)

Day 7: Back to Tokyo

Interests

• Onsen (hot spring)
• Artsy villages
• Maybe extreme snow

Ideas of places to go

1) Here is a list of winter festivals in Japan during the time we will be there including:

• Hachinohe Enburi folk festival and dance (Aomori February 17-20)
• A whole series of drift ice festivals in Hokkaido
• Yuki doro snow lantern festival (February 8-11)
• Namahage Sedo child scaring festival (Akita Feburary 7-9)
• Akita Inukko snow dog sculpture festival (Akita Feburary 8-9)
• Yokote snow festival with kamakura and bonden (Akita February 15-17)
• Wave Artists at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum (Tokyo February 19-March 7)
• Amakusa Festival of Food (Amakusa February 15-16)
• 8th Tenmatenjin Umeshu Convention (Osaka February 15-23)
• Tokamachi Snow Festival (Niigata February 14-16) including "giant snow sculptures and stage performances; and the Nakasato Setsugen Carnival, in which a local ski resort is covered in candles to create a surreal, beautiful scene; and the Muko-nage Festival, where young men who have married during the past year are thrown into snowdrifts."
• Kite-flying contest at Tsuda no Matsubara (Kagawa February 9)
• Uesugi Snow Lantern Festival (Yamagata February 7-9)

2) Yokai town (Sakaiminato, Tottori prefecture)　

• http://www.sakaiminato.net/

3) God's conference town (Izumo, Shimane prefecture)

• https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Izumo
• The conference is in October, so gods won't be around when we go.

Note: The government of Japan maintains this list of important intangible folk cultural properties. Several refer to events that occur during our window:

Rokugō Kamakura (六郷のカマクラ行事) in Akita on February 11-15.

the Mona Satoimo Festival (茂名の里芋祭) which is a kind of potato festival in Chiba on February 19-22.

if you like oni, there is the Oni Festival of Toyohashi Shinmei Shrine (豊橋神明社の鬼祭) on February 10-11

the Spring Hoe Festival of Higoshi Shinmei Shrine (樋越神明宮の春鍬祭) on February 11.

To do

• Watch kabuki
• Watch sumo
• Onsen (hot spring)