Nagaoka Matsuri

The Nagaoka Matsuri is famous for it’s display of fireworks launched from the riverbanks of Shinano-gawa river. I however was traveling through there on the first day of the 3 day-festival and during that first day of the festival they have a huge gathering of Odori dance groups and mikoshis instead of fireworks.

The origin of this festival is a bit a sad one. The firework marks the anniversary of the US fire bombing Nagaoka during WW2. During those days many lives have been lost and most of old Nagaoka was burned down, which is the reason why there aren’t many old wooden buildings to see in this town (it’s mostly concrete now and not very attractive).

Transport: Joetsu-Shinkansen line has fast trains from Tokyo to Nagaoka (about 90 minutes travel time).

Website: The festival has an official website here (all in Japanese) and the Japan Tourism Organization has some slightly outdates/incomplete info in English here.