Walk at night among glowing bamboo lanterns
On a few autumn evenings, some towns cut bamboo into lanterns, set a candle or small light inside, and line their bamboo groves, old lanes and temple steps with them. You stroll slowly along the glowing paths, through scenes that look nothing like they do by day. Each festival lasts only one to three days a year, so check the dates before you plan a trip around one.
A path through a bamboo grove in Muko, just southwest of Kyoto, where the stalks rise high overhead. On the evenings of Kaguya no Yube in October, named for the princess found inside a bamboo stalk in an old Japanese tale, candles float in cut bamboo tubes along the path. There is no parking, so go by train.
A preserved district of lattice-windowed merchant houses in Takehara, a small town on the Seto Inland Sea, where some 5,000 bamboo lanterns light the streets during Takehara Shokei no Michi each autumn. Bamboo artworks stand along the way as you walk the glowing lanes. Takehara is about 70 minutes by express bus from Hiroshima.
A stone-paved lane past temples and old walls in Usuki, a castle town in Oita on the island of Kyushu. During Usuki Takeyoi each November, small bamboo lamps and bamboo sculptures glow around every turn of the lane. It is far from Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka, so it suits a trip around Kyushu.
Stone steps lined with sixteen statues of rakan, the Buddha's disciples, in the old castle town of Taketa. During Chikuraku each November, bamboo lanterns line the steps and the stone faces appear in their glow. Taketa is in Oita on Kyushu, about 10 minutes on foot from Bungo-Taketa Station.