八海山火渡大祭 Hakkai-san Fire Festival

Went for the annual Hakkai-san shrine fire-walking festival. Loads of people! Where do they find the time on a weekday afternoon?!

The large gravel carpark in front of Hakkai-san shrine was used as the festival ground. There were many festival food stalls and large colourful streamers were hung overhead.
Long snaking queue to walk across the hot coals. Participants ranged from young children (who had cold feet just before the fire pit and had to be carried across by their parents/grandparents) to old folk who were bent double and using walking sticks! Some were dressed in some kind of pilgrimage outfit, others wore their own clothes.
As you approach the fire pit, the priests (in white) will bless you by waving this stick with white streamers attached at you.
Then you walk through the fire pit. It's actually just hot coals. Some ran helter-skelter across while others took slow deliberate steps.
Video of the fire-walking. You can hear the prayers (buddhist sutras I think) blaring through the loudspeakers in the background. Use this link if you can't view the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReJ90wnhkAA



After that, there is a foot bath for you to wash your feet. The soles of the participants who finished walking were very dirty!

Took the opportunity to have a look-see around the shrine. The last time I was there was when we were doing our warm-up before climbing Hakkai-san so there wasn't really time to look at the shrine.

Pagoda near the entrance of the shrine

Entrance of the shrine

Hakkai-san shrine

View of the festival ground from the shrine