Shimmachi Tanabata Festival

The Shimmachi Tanabata Festival is a community event held around JR Shimmachi Station and the station-front street in the Shimmachi district of Takasaki, Gunma. Usually on a Friday-Sunday in early July, the station-front and Ginza streets are brightly decorated with colorful streamers. The festival features fair stalls, medaka-scooping and sales of local vegetables, while in the evening the Otona Yomise night market offers food and street live music to enjoy among the decorations. It is a locally rooted summer tradition that enlivens the historic shopping street of Shimmachi, a former post town on the Nakasendo. (Note: dates are based on the previous year.)