Festival period:
03~06 August annually
One of the three great festivals of the Tohoku region, the Akita Kanto Festival’s highlight is in the evenings, when you can marvel at the energetic and highly-skilled performers balancing large kanto (bamboo pole lanterns) with all parts of their bodies (forehead, hip, palms, shoulders etc). The kanto can have up to 46 paper lanterns attached, weigh up to 50kg and be up to 12m long!