9 to 10 Oct 2026
Be in Takayama on the evening of the ninth: the lantern parade happens that night only, and the last highway bus to Nagoya leaves before it starts, so book a room in town.
9 to 10 Oct 2026. Times are approximate and can change from year to year.
The floats line Omotesando until about five.
Performed on one of the floats, about fifty minutes each time.
A costumed procession sets off from Omotesando.
The floats go round again hung with lanterns, until about half past nine. Tonight only.
The procession sets off again, earlier in the day.
The second day's two performances. Floats on display until about four.
The floats are the reason. Eleven of them belong to the autumn festival, tall wooden carts carved, lacquered and hung with embroidery, and for two days they stand in a line along the approach to the shrine where you can walk right up to them.
It is counted among Japan's three most beautiful festivals, and the float festivals of Japan are on UNESCO's list of intangible heritage. Takayama is a small town, so the whole thing happens within a few streets of the old quarter.
The marionette show runs on one float twice a day, around noon and two on the ninth, eleven and one on the tenth, each about fifty minutes. A costumed procession leaves Omotesando in the early afternoon on the ninth and in the morning on the tenth. Photograph the floats while they stand on display, not in the crush of the parade. If it rains the parades are cancelled, the storehouse doors are opened instead, and the Floats Exhibition Hall by the shrine shows four of the eleven all year.
Stay in Takayama itself for the night of the ninth, and book months ahead. Gero and Hida-Furukawa are fallbacks only if the last train back fits the evening.
Where to base yourself, and what else is on
The Takayama guide has the old town and the rest of the year.
Sixteen days of beer tents and brass bands on a Munich meadow. Get there on a weekday morning and a bench is yours without a booking.
Lima's purple month: a float carried through the old centre from dawn into the night on five days in October.