Sumida River Fireworks Festival

隅田川花火大会 (Sumida Gawa Hanabi Taikai) – Sumida River Fireworks Festival, 2016.
Taken from 白髭橋 (Shirahige Bashi) – Shirahige Bridge.

This summer I missed a lot of festival. Weather––Too hot, high humidity, sometimes raining all day––is one of the reason. I missed Yokohama Hanabi (Yokohama Fireworks) festival few weeks ago (which lately I heard that they will have fireworks festival again in the middle of August), but not for this one, Sumida River Fireworks Festival.

If July is the best month to shopping (summer sale everywhere), August will be a good month to spend your time outside (if you can stand of the hot weather and high humidity), because the peak of summer festival is coming! And for me August is like the highlight of summer, not only because of the summer festival, but also I get exciting for trying other new places near Tokyo, like park, beach, anything. Also, August I will attend the Independence Day of Indonesia (17 Agustusan say bahasa kerennya), excited!

Ok, let’s talk about the fireworks festival!

Here’s a tips and trick when you want to attend big festival in Tokyo, Japan:

Read full information

Japan people very communicative. By saying this, I mean you can get as much information as you want! Go search the website of the event, read, and also highlight the time event.

Experience like a local

When you go to any summer festival, if you want to feel like local, you can wear Yukata, a casual summer kimono. Don’t worry about wether you might be a victim of wrong costume. Trust me, there will many Japanese people (even tourist) will wear it. You can get cheap Yukata during summer sale in most Japanese shop, or go to Uniqlo. The rent price might be the same like if you buy a new one during summer.

You also can picnic! Don’t forget to bring your floor mat, portable chair, food and drinks and find a nice place to sit to enjoy fireworks. There’s also many street food near the festival. You can find cheap and nice picnic stuff at Daiso or every 100 yens shop.

Wear comfort shoes, and outfit

If you’re not planning to wear Yukata, you can wear usual outfit. Comfy sneakers, breathable clothes, sunglass, hat, whatever you want.

Bring your camera

I am type a person who seize the moment, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to capture a beautiful shot for my gallery. Remember, memories can fade but photo keep all the memory at that moment ;) And don’t forget to research the place and good shot at the event before you go.

Arrived early

This is very important. My experience attending Sumida River Fireworks Festival is you need at least 2 hours before the event start, 4-5 hours even better, so you can get into the place that usually will close when the event start. They are very concern about the crowd. I mean, unlike in Indonesia when you get in the train and you can be like Liberty Statue of Leaning Tower of Pisa. In Japan, as crowded as it can be, it won’t be like that. You can still breathe and smell the fresh (and hot!) air. 

I think so far that’s all I can highlight for the tips and trick.

I came around 5:45 p.m, the event should be start at 6:30 p.m––which turned out at 7:00 p.m––I can get inside the area near the river. Every boat on the Sumida River already packed with people who reserved earlier. And as I try to search good spot to view the Fireworks, I see bridge that won’t be close when event began, even I still not sure for it. We walked from Asakusa Station to Oshiage Station near Tokyo Skytree to get train to the place that I think it will be a good spot to see fireworks (not to meantion that we missed the station because we took an express instead of local train, so we have to get back again lol), and my gut was right!

Tokyo Skytree during the dawn.

Area around Shirahige Bride is one of the option to see Sumida River Fireworks Festival. There's a rooftop near Denny’s where you can sit and chill to see the fireworks, or walk around Shirahige Bridge. There will be many police guard there for safety reason prevent overcrowd on the bridge, since it has maximum amount of bearing capacity.

You can go to Sumida River Fireworks Festival each year during summer, and it always full of crowd. It’s the oldest fireworks festival in Tokyo, at the Old Tokyo.

How to get there (Shirahige Bridge)?

Look for Higashi-Mujima Station from wherever you are,

Look for Meiji Dōri (Meiji Street) Shirahige Bridge is about 200 meters from Denny’s .