🧒 Kids

📍 Hokkaido, Asahikawa 🆓 Free ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Heiwa-dōri Kaimono Kōen (Peace Street Sculpture Walk)

Japan's first permanent pedestrian mall, a kilometer of car-free street running from Asahikawa Station lined with roughly 100 outdoor sculptures — including a 28-metre stainless-steel question mark.

Uwara Risokyo

A 2.3-kilometer clifftop loop past a hand-carved tunnel, a bell for good luck, and a string of named capes above the Pacific — a rias-coast hike that starts five minutes from a train station.

Uwara Beach

A gently shelving cove ranked among Japan's 100 best beaches, where a white torii gate stands facing the sea and shallow, calm water has drawn swimming families for generations.

Katsuura Morning Market

One of Japan's three largest morning markets, running on the same two streets since 1591 — fishers and farmers still set up stalls before dawn, six days a week, over 400 years later.

🔭 Viewpoint

Cape Hachiman Park

A former castle cape juts into Katsuura Bay with a sea-view plaza, playground equipment, walking paths, and a statue of the shogun's mistress who once lived on this ground.

JAXA Katsuura Space Communication Center

Free, walk-in exhibition hall beneath JAXA's giant satellite-tracking dishes, with life-size satellite models, a Hayabusa asteroid-mission simulator, and rockets to gawk at — no reservation needed for small groups.

📍 Chiba, Katsuura 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Katsuura Undersea Park Underwater Observation Tower

A tower 60 meters offshore where a spiral staircase drops 8 meters below the waves so visitors can watch wild fish swim past the windows — Japan's largest underwater observatory.

📍 Chiba, Futtsu 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Mother Farm

A 250-hectare hillside ranch on the Boso Peninsula where roughly 150 sheep run the 'Great Sheep March' every day and shearing shows, cow milking, and rapeseed fields keep families busy for hours.

📍 Tochigi, Nakagawa 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Hoshi no Mieru Oka Nouen (Star-Viewing Hill Farm)

A small, naturally-farmed vineyard in the hills near Nasu where you pick straight off ~100 vines across 14 grape varieties and pay by the kilo — no flat entry fee, just cheap fruit you carry home yourself.

📍 Kanagawa, Yokohama 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Nissan Water Park

A heated indoor water park built directly under the east-gate stands of Nissan Stadium — Japan's largest stadium — where you can swim laps beneath the seats that once held a World Cup final.

📍 Chiang Mai, Mae Taeng 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Bua Tong Sticky Waterfalls

A waterfall you climb UP, barefoot, with no ropes: the mineral limestone is so grippy your feet stick to it even under flowing water — one of the strangest physical sensations in Thailand, and completely free.

📍 Kanchanaburi, Sai Yok 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Sai Yok Noi Waterfall

A wide, easygoing roadside waterfall near Nam Tok where the river fans down a limestone face into shallow pools — a favourite local cool-off spot at the far end of the Death Railway line.

📍 Ibaraki, Goka 🆓 Free ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Yakult Ibaraki Factory

A free, hour-long tour of the plant that grows Yakult's Shirota-strain lactic acid bacteria and bottles the drink, ending with a tasting.

📍 Gunma, Tatebayashi 🆓 Free ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Calpis "Mirai" Museum

A free factory tour at Asahi's Gunma plant tracing Calpis from its 1919 invention to the fermentation tanks making it today, with a tasting at the end.

📍 Samut Prakan, Mueang Samut Prakan 💴 Paid ⏱ Full day

Ancient City (Muang Boran)

Billed as the world's largest open-air museum — a vast park, shaped like Thailand itself, scattered with full-size and scaled replicas of the country's greatest monuments, best explored by bicycle over a whole unhurried day.

📍 Ayutthaya, Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Ayutthaya River Prawns (Kung Mae Nam)

The old capital's signature feast: enormous freshwater river prawns — often longer than your hand — grilled in the shell until the head fills with rich orange roe, served at riverside restaurants ringing the island city.

📍 Bangkok, Bangkok 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Bangkok Snake Farm (Queen Saovabha Institute)

The world's second-oldest antivenom facility — a working Red Cross research centre where you can watch live venom-extraction shows and meet cobras, vipers, and king cobras in the heart of the city.

📍 Kanchanaburi, Si Sawat 💴 Paid ⏱ Full day

Erawan Falls

Seven tiers of waterfall descending through jungle, each pooling into water so improbably turquoise it looks dyed — swim in most of them, while resident fish nibble your feet whether invited or not.

📍 Bangkok, Bangkok 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Jodd Fairs Night Market

A buzzing, photogenic night market behind Rama IX — hundreds of food and drink stalls, vintage shopping, and the viral 'leng saap' volcano of stacked pork-rib soup, all framed by the glittering city skyline.

📍 Ratchaburi, Mueang Ratchaburi 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Khao Bin Cave (Tham Khao Bin)

A long, well-lit show cave near Ratchaburi threading through a series of named chambers full of dramatic stalactites and flowstone formations — cool, quiet, and easy to walk.

📍 Bangkok, Bangkok 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Museum of Illusions Bangkok

A playful indoor museum of optical tricks, tilted rooms, and mind-bending installations — walk through an infinity room, shrink and grow in the Ames room, and photograph yourself defying gravity.

📍 Bangkok, Bangkok 🆓 Free ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Or Tor Kor Market

A famously clean, top-quality fresh market across from Chatuchak — pyramids of perfect mangoes, pungent ranks of durian, glistening curries and prepared foods, regularly rated among the world's best food markets.

📍 Bangkok, Bangkok 🎫 Varies ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Unicorn Café

A gloriously over-the-top pastel fever dream off Silom — rainbow everything, a wall of plush unicorns, sparkly unicorn onesies to borrow, and rainbow spaghetti and candyfloss drinks served under a haze of glitter.

📍 Bangkok, Bangkok 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Victory Monument Boat Noodles

A canalside alley of stalls serving 'boat noodles' in deliberately tiny bowls — rich, dark, offal-and-blood-thickened broth eaten a few slurps at a time, with diners stacking their empty bowls into towers to tally the bill.

📍 Hokkaido, Asahikawa 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Asahiyama Zoo Penguin Walk

At Japan's northernmost zoo, the winter highlight isn't an exhibit — it's a parade of king penguins waddling right past your feet through the snow, twice a day.

❄️ Winter

🎏 Festival

Atami Sea Fireworks Festival

A hot-spring bay shaped like a mortar amplifies these fireworks into a stadium-like roar — Atami runs roughly 15 shows a year, several of them landing on late-summer weekends, each ending in a 'Great Sky Niagara' finale reflected on the water.

📍 Shizuoka, Atami 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

📍 Oita, Beppu 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

The Hells of Beppu (Jigoku Meguri)

A tour of seven boiling, steaming, technicolor hot springs you absolutely cannot bathe in — cobalt-blue, blood-red, and one with crocodiles — where the only thing you soak is an egg.

📍 Yamagata, Yamagata 🆓 Free ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Bunshokan (Former Yamagata Prefectural Office)

A grand English-Renaissance government hall from 1916 with a landmark clock tower, free to wander — marble stairs, a chandeliered assembly chamber, and balconies that make it Yamagata City's most unexpectedly elegant indoor stop.

📍 Osaka, Ikeda 🆓 Free ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Cup Noodles Museum, Ikeda

A shrine to instant ramen on the spot where it was invented — design your own Cup Noodle, walk a tunnel wall of 800 packages, and salute the shed where Momofuku Ando changed dinner forever.

📍 Tochigi, Nikko 💴 Paid ⏱ Full day

Edo Wonderland Nikko Edomura

A living theme park that rebuilds an entire Edo-period town — costumed townsfolk, ninja shows, an oiran procession, and a 'haunted temple' — where you can rent a kimono and spend a day in the age of the samurai.

📍 Kanagawa, Fujisawa 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Enoshima Island

A small tidal island off Kanagawa reached on foot over a causeway, packed onto one hill: a sea-dragon shrine, candlelit sea caves, a beachside lighthouse tower, and sweeping Sagami Bay views — all in a single easy loop.

📍 Kanagawa, Kawasaki 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Fujiko F. Fujio Museum

A joyful museum in Kawasaki devoted to the creator of Doraemon and friends — original manga art, a rooftop play world, and that famous blue robot cat waiting in the garden.

📍 Hokkaido, Nakafurano 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Farm Tomita Lavender Fields

Hokkaido's most famous flower farm, where July turns whole hillsides into stripes of purple lavender and rainbow flowers — and everyone leaves clutching a lavender soft-serve.

📍 Kanagawa, Hakone 💴 Paid ⏱ Full day

Hakone: Owakudani & Lake Ashi

A volcanic valley of sulfurous steam vents where the local specialty is an egg boiled black in the hot springs (said to add seven years to your life), followed by a ropeway descent to a pirate-ship cruise across Lake Ashi with Mt. Fuji on the horizon.

🍁 Autumn

📍 Ibaraki, Hitachinaka 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Hitachi Seaside Park

A vast coastal park where an entire hillside turns sky-blue with 4.5 million nemophila flowers each spring, then blood-red with kochia bushes in autumn — one of Japan's great seasonal color spectacles.

🌸 Spring 🍁 Autumn

📍 Hokkaido, Hokuryu 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Hokuryu Sunflower Village (Himawari no Sato)

Two million sunflowers across 23 hectares of hillside — one of Japan's largest sunflower fields, grown by a tiny farming town of 1,600 people, with sunflower mazes, rental bikes, and sunflower soft-serve at peak bloom.

📍 Kagoshima, Ibusuki 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Ibusuki Natural Sand Baths

Get buried up to your neck in naturally steaming volcanic sand on a black-sand beach at the southern tip of Kyushu — a 300-year-old bathing ritual found almost nowhere else on Earth.

📍 Yamagata, Kaminoyama 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Kaminoyama Castle & Onsen

A storybook white castle keep crowning a green hill above a 560-year-old hot-spring town threaded with free street footbaths — climb the tower for valley views, then soak your feet on a bench in the lane below.

📍 Chiba, Kamogawa 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Kamogawa Sea World

A seaside aquarium on the Boso coast famous for its powerful orca show — killer whales leaping against the backdrop of the open Pacific — plus belugas, dolphins, and a walk-through polar zone.

📍 Yamanashi, Koshu 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Katsunuma Grape Picking (Grapark)

Japan's wine country, a short trip from Tokyo: an entire hillside of vineyards where you pay by weight to pick and eat 16+ grape varieties straight off the vine, from Kyoho and Delaware to Shine Muscat.

📍 Tokyo, Meguro 🆓 Free ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Meguro Parasitological Museum

A tiny, free, two-floor museum dedicated entirely to parasites — home to a preserved 8.8-metre tapeworm and a gift shop selling parasite keychains. Tokyo's most gleefully strange date spot.

📍 Hokkaido, Sapporo 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Moerenuma Park

A former landfill on the edge of Sapporo, reborn as a vast piece of land-art by sculptor Isamu Noguchi: geometric grass pyramids, a glass pyramid, and a fountain that performs like a show.

📍 Yamagata, Tozawa 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Mogami River Boat Ride

Drift down the broad, green Mogami — one of Japan's three great rapid rivers — in a flat-bottomed wooden boat while the boatman poles you past gorge walls and waterfalls and sings the old river song by heart.

📍 Saitama, Nagatoro 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Nagatoro River Rafting

A pole-steered raft trip down the Arakawa River past Iwadatami — a government-designated 'cultural landscape' of flat, layered rock shelves — alternating calm float-and-swim stretches with sudden rapids, about two hours from Tokyo.

📍 Hokkaido, Kamishihoro 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Naitai Highland Farm

Japan's largest public dairy ranch — 17 square kilometers of open grass, 2,000 grazing cows, a 7km driving road climbing to a glass-walled hilltop terrace, and soft-serve made from the herd below you.

📍 Tochigi, Nasushiobara 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Nasu Senbonmatsu Farm

A breezy dairy farm on the Nasu plain where you can drink the milk fresh as soft-serve, pet the animals, try archery or fishing, and — on calm mornings — drift up over the fields in a tethered hot-air balloon.

📍 Hiroshima, Takehara 💴 Paid ⏱ Full day

Okunoshima (Rabbit Island)

A small island in the Inland Sea overrun by hundreds of friendly wild rabbits — and a sobering secret past as a hidden poison-gas factory the maps once deliberately erased.

🌸 Spring 🌻 Summer 🍁 Autumn

📍 Saitama, Saitama 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

The Railway Museum, Omiya

A cathedral of trains in Saitama: real locomotives from steam to shinkansen parked in a vast hall, a turntable that spins a steam engine to a whistle, and driving simulators for would-be conductors.

📍 Hokkaido, Biei 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Shikisai-no-Oka Flower Hills

Fifteen hectares of Biei hillside striped in ribbon-bands of flowers — ride a tractor-pulled 'Norokko' wagon through the color, then feed the alpacas at the ranch on top. Peak stripes run late July through September.

📍 Tokyo, Minato 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

teamLab Borderless (Azabudai Hills)

A borderless digital art museum where projected light, water, and flowers spill between rooms and react to visitors walking through them — no fixed floor plan, no map that fully makes sense, and no two visits quite the same.

📍 Yamagata, Sakata 💴 Paid ⏱ Full day

Tobishima Island

Yamagata's only inhabited offshore island, a tiny green dot an hour by ferry from Sakata — clear blue water, seabird colonies, fresh-grilled fish, and a slow, salt-air pace that feels a world away from the mainland summer.

📍 Tochigi, Nikko 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Tobu World Square

A theme park near Nikko where you tower like a giant over the whole world: 100-plus famous landmarks — the Pyramids, the Eiffel Tower, the Taj Mahal, Tokyo — rebuilt in flawless 1:25 miniature, peopled by 140,000 tiny figures.

⛩️ Shrine & Temple

Ushiku Daibutsu

One of the tallest statues on Earth: a 120-metre bronze Buddha visible from miles across the Ibaraki plain, with an elevator inside that lifts you to a viewing deck in its chest.

📍 Ibaraki, Ushiku 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

📍 Tochigi, Utsunomiya 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Utsunomiya, the Gyoza Capital

The Tochigi city that eats more gyoza than anywhere in Japan — dozens of specialist dumpling shops, a friendly rivalry with Hamamatsu, and a beloved stone statue of a gyoza wrapped in its own dumpling skin.

📍 Miyagi, Shiroishi 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Zao Fox Village

A mountain forest in Miyagi where more than a hundred fluffy foxes roam free around you — red, silver, and arctic-white — dozing in heaps and cheerfully ignoring every rule posted about them.

❄️ Winter

📍 Yamagata, Sagae 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Cherryland Sagae

A roadside park entirely themed around cherries in the town that grows Japan's finest — a Ferris wheel, a cherry museum, all-you-can-pick orchards in June, and cherry soft-serve, jam, and sweets the rest of the year.

📍 Gunma, Ota 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Japan Snake Center

A delightfully old-school research park in Gunma devoted entirely to snakes — hundreds of them, from rat snakes to vipers — where you can watch a feeding, hold a python, and meet the staff's scaly stars.

📍 Yamagata, Tsuruoka 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Kamo Aquarium (Jellyfish Dream)

A white aquarium on the Tsuruoka coast that holds the world's largest jellyfish collection — a Guinness record 50-plus species — climaxing in a five-metre 'Jellyfish Dream' tank where 2,000 moon jellies drift in slow, glowing circles.

📍 Yamagata, Nakayama 💴 Paid ⏱ Full day

Lina World

Yamagata's homegrown amusement park: a friendly, unflashy spread of roller coasters, a big Ferris wheel, a water ride, carousels and character shows — the kind of all-day, low-stress fun that's perfect for families with younger kids.

📍 Chiba, Futtsu 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Mother Farm

A huge hilltop farm-park on the Boso Peninsula with sheep races, hand-feedable capybaras and alpacas, seasonal flower fields, and Tokyo Bay views — wholesome chaos with a Ferris wheel.

📍 Tochigi, Nasu 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Nasu Animal Kingdom

A sprawling highland zoo where you can hand-feed capybaras, walk among free-roaming birds and alpacas, watch a thrilling raptor flight show — and, in winter, see capybaras soak in their own steaming hot bath.

📍 Tochigi, Nasu 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Nasu Flower World

A hillside of striped flower terraces high on the Nasu plateau — tulips, poppies, salvia and broom turning the slopes into bands of color, all rolling up toward the bare volcanic cone of Mt. Nasu behind.

🌸 Spring 🌻 Summer 🍁 Autumn

📍 Tochigi, Nasu 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Nasu Heisei-no-Mori & Komadome Falls

A former Imperial forest opened to the public in 2011, where free boardwalk trails wind through old-growth woods to viewpoints over the 20-metre Komadome Falls — gentle, hushed, and royally well-kept.

🍁 Autumn

📍 Tochigi, Nasu 💴 Paid ⏱ Full day

Nasu Highland Park

A forest amusement park near the foot of Mt. Nasu with ten roller coasters and dozens of rides among the trees — from a wooden-style woodie to a spinning 'Camelback' — plus zip lines and an adventure forest.

📍 Tochigi, Nasu 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Nasu Safari Park

Drive your own car through a free-range park of around 70 species — lions, tigers, giraffes, rhinos — feeding them from the window, and come back after dark for a thrilling night safari among rare white lions.

📍 Tochigi, Nasu 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Nasu Teddy Bear Museum

A cozy English-cottage museum in the Nasu highlands stuffed with antique and artist teddy bears from around the world — plus a beloved life-size Totoro-and-Catbus room that delights every visitor.

📍 Tochigi, Nasu 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Nasu Trick Art Museum

A highland gallery of mind-bending optical illusions where the paintings reach out and grab you — pose to be eaten by a shark, hang off a cliff, or shake hands with the Mona Lisa, camera ready.

📍 Yamagata, Sakata 🆓 Free ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

Sankyo Soko Rice Warehouses

A photogenic row of black-walled wooden rice warehouses from 1893, screened by a line of tall zelkova trees that keep the rice cool — a serene slice of old Sakata made famous by the TV drama 'Oshin.'

📍 Gunma, Takasaki 💴 Paid ⏱ ≈ 1 hour

⛩️ Shrine & Temple

Takasaki Byakue Daikannon

A serene 41.8-metre goddess of mercy in gleaming white concrete stands on a hill above Takasaki — you climb a staircase inside her body, past tiny windows, all the way up to her shoulders.

📍 Yamagata, Tendo 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Tendo, the Shogi-Piece Town

The town that carves about 95% of Japan's shogi (Japanese chess) pieces leans all the way in — giant chess pieces on the streets, shogi-shaped everything, craftsmen you can watch at work, and an April festival played on a board of costumed humans.

📍 Chiba, Sodegaura 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Tokyo German Village

A flower-and-amusement park in Chiba that is famously neither in Tokyo nor especially German — but redeems the name each winter with one of the Kanto region's largest and most beloved light illuminations.

❄️ Winter

📍 Yamagata, Yonezawa 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Uesugi Shrine & Yonezawa Beef

A dignified shrine on the moated site of Yonezawa Castle, honoring the warlord Uesugi Kenshin — and the gateway to one of Japan's three great wagyu brands, Yonezawa beef, grilled and sizzling all over town.

📍 Yamagata, Yamagata 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day

Yamadera (Risshaku-ji)

A thousand stone steps climb through cedar forest and rock to a cliffside temple where the poet Bashō once paused — the reward is a wooden hall clinging to the precipice and a view straight down the green valley.

📍 Yamagata, Tsuruoka 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day

Yunohama Beach

A long, gentle sand beach on the Japan Sea coast near Tsuruoka, with shallow swimming water, a torii standing out in the waves, and famously glowing sunsets — Yamagata's easygoing summer seaside, with a hot spring right behind it.

📍 Mie, Kuwana 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day 🗓 Oct 18 – May 31

Nabana no Sato Winter Illumination

One of Japan's largest light shows: millions of LEDs transform a flower park into glowing tunnels and a wall-sized animated light panorama that changes theme each year.

🍁 Autumn ❄️ Winter 🌸 Spring

📍 Bangkok, Bangkok 🆓 Free ⏱ Full day 🗓 Apr 13 – Apr 15

Songkran (Thai New Year)

For three days every April, the whole country turns into the world's biggest water fight — Thai New Year, where soaking strangers with buckets and hoses is both a blessing and a national pastime.

📍 Yamanashi, Fujikawaguchiko 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day 🗓 Apr 18 – May 31

Fuji Shibazakura Festival

Half a million pink moss-phlox blossoms carpet the ground in waves of color beneath Mt. Fuji each spring — a knockout foreground for Japan's most famous mountain.

🌸 Spring

📍 Hokkaido, Toyako 🆓 Free ⏱ ≈ 1 hour 🗓 Apr 28 – Oct 31

Lake Toya Long-Run Fireworks

Fireworks every single night for six months straight: from late April to the end of October, a boat cruises Lake Toya's shoreline launching a 20-minute show — visible from every onsen hotel, footbath, and lakeside bench in town.

🌸 Spring 🌻 Summer 🍁 Autumn

📍 Akita, Akita 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day 🗓 Aug 3 – Aug 6

Akita Kanto Festival

Performers balance 12-metre bamboo poles hung with up to 46 glowing paper lanterns — on their palms, foreheads, and hips — in a swaying river of light through the summer streets of Akita.

📍 Yamagata, Yamagata 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day 🗓 Aug 5 – Aug 7

Yamagata Hanagasa Festival

One of Tohoku's great summer festivals: for three August nights, thousands of dancers in flower-decorated straw 'hanagasa' hats sweep down the main street of Yamagata City to thundering drums and the cry of 'Yassho, makasho!'

📍 Tokyo, Koto 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day 🗓 Aug 12 – Aug 16

Fukagawa Hachiman Matsuri (Mizukake Water-Splashing Festival)

One of Edo's three great festivals, where over 50 mikoshi are carried 8km through Fukagawa while bystanders and firefighters soak the bearers with buckets, hoses, and squirt guns — 2026 is a triennial 'grand festival' year.

📍 Yamagata, Tsuruoka 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day 🗓 Aug 15

Akagawa Fireworks Festival

Billed as 'Japan's most moving fireworks show': on one August night, 12,000 fireworks are launched in choreographed bursts synced to music across a 700-metre stretch of the Akagawa river in Tsuruoka — one of Tohoku's very best hanabi.

📍 Tokyo, Suginami 🆓 Free ⏱ Half day 🗓 Aug 29 – Aug 30

Koenji Awa Odori

A 400-year-old Tokushima folk dance transplanted to a Tokyo train-station neighborhood: 10,000 dancers in eight troupes parade a figure-eight route through Koenji over one weekend, watched by roughly a million people.

📍 Yamagata, Yamagata 💴 Paid ⏱ Half day 🗓 Sep 20

🍜 Food Seasonal event

Yamagata Imoni Festival

A whole city gathers on a riverbed each September to share a single pot of taro-and-beef stew — a SIX-metre cauldron stirred by a construction crane, cooking 30,000 bowls of 'imoni' for everyone who shows up.

🍁 Autumn