On July 30, 2023, the main festival of the Ine Festival, which prays for safe seas and good catches, was held in the Kameshima and Hirata districts of Ine, Kyoto Prefecture. This year, for the first time in four years, the "Sea Togyo" was held, and festival boats and kagura boats decorated with banners crossed Ine Bay.
The festival is said to have started in the Edo period at Yasaka Shrine (Kameshima, Ine-cho), which is said to have a deep connection with Gion in Kyoto.
Festival boats and Kagura boats with brightly colored banners depart from the Kameshima district, where funaya houses are lined up, at around 12:30 pm. Heading to Yasaka Shrine on the opposite shore, we slowly made our way through the bay with the sound of drums and drums. On the boat, children also performed sword swings and stick swings.
In the Hirata area, children carried a mikoshi (portable shrine) and paraded around the area, making energetic voices of "Wasshoi, wasshoi" despite the heat.
Masahito Yagi (15 years old), a first-year student at Miyazu Amanohashi High School Miyazu Gakusha, who performed the taiko drums on the festival boat, said with a smile, "The festival is fun and makes the community lively. I'm glad we were able to hold it."
