Japan
Yokote
Children serving hot amazake inside snow igloos lit by candles during the February kamakura festival.
In February, the snow piles high enough to build rooms inside it. Yokote's kamakura festival fills the city with hundreds of snow igloos, each lit from within by candles and presided over by children who invite passers-by inside for hot amazake rice wine and grilled mochi. The soft glow through ice walls turns every street into a lantern procession.
Yokote sits in southern Akita Prefecture, in the Yokote Basin where heavy snowfall from the Sea of Japan accumulates throughout winter. The Kamakura Festival, held annually on 15-16 February, dates back over 450 years and centres on snow domes approximately three metres high, each containing a small altar to the water deity Suijin. Over the festival nights, approximately one hundred large kamakura and several hundred miniature ones line the riverbanks and temple grounds. Yokote is also the birthplace of Yokote yakisoba — thick noodles fried with cabbage and pork, topped with a wobbly fried egg and Worcestershire sauce — recognised as one of Japan's top B-class gourmet dishes.
Family
Children crawl into snow igloos lit by candles, accept hot amazake from other children, and eat grilled mochi in the snow. The festival is gentle, magical, and built for families.
Friends
The kamakura festival's communal warmth — strangers handing you rice wine inside snow domes — turns a group visit into a series of spontaneous encounters. Yakisoba crawls through the covered market fill the daytime.
- Kamakura snow igloos fill the city every February — children sit inside offering amazake sweet rice wine and mochi to visitors.
- The Bonten Festival sees teams racing enormous bamboo poles through the streets, crashing them together for blessings.
- Yokote yakisoba — thick noodles fried with pork and cabbage, topped with a sunny-side egg — is the city's signature dish.
- The castle grounds overlook the Yokote River and the snow-covered rice plains stretching flat to the mountains.
Yokote yakisoba — fried noodles topped with a fried egg and Worcestershire sauce.
Inaniwa udon from the neighbouring valley, silky and hand-pulled.
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