As I mentioned the other day, August is all festivals and fireworks. With a bit of free time, went down to Enoshima yesterday to watch another fireworks display.
Anyway, it was probably one of the best fireworks displays I have ever seen (including numerous “Symphony of Fire” displays in Toronto over the years), so it is definitely worth seeing if you happen to be in the area.
However, the problem with actually seeing the show is that you then encounter tremendous difficulty getting out of the area. This is the second time I have been to see fireworks at Enoshima and I now recall why there has been almost a 10-year gap since the first time and now: well over 100,000 people all departing the beach at exactly the same time and trying to get to a train station that, at best, is designed to accommodate maybe 1,000.
Despite waiting 90 minutes after the show ended before even leaving the beach, the mass of people (many who would have been in line for that 90 minutes) trying to get to Katase-Enoshima station was unfathomable. The line up stretched from the station right to the parking lot entrance of the beach (a distance of about three-quarters of a kilometre) and was about a hundred people across.
When you actually start thinking about the logistics it is mind-boggling: NO extra transportation is arranged at all to deal with the influx of thousands and thousands of people. All they do is add hundreds of security guards and police officers to direct pedestrians and help them cross at the traffic lights. Yes, that’s right, they don’t even close the road to allow the crowd to disperse more widely. Why, for example, don’t they run shuttle buses from the beach to 3 or 4 of the major train stations nearby (Fujisawa, Zushi, Chigasaki, Ofuna)? This would at least get people moving in different directions to the places they want to go. Instead, tiny Katase-Enoshima station is like a ridiculous little funnel transporting people a few stops to Fujisawa so that they can switch to the JR lines and go either East or West.
Of course, there are other options: the Enoden and the Shonan monorail. Neither is great - they are both extremely limited in capacity and not designed to transport a gazillion people in such a short span of time. After our first attempt (at the 90 minute mark), we ended up having another drink on the beach and waiting another 45 minutes or so before attempting to get to the Shonan monorail in order to get to Ofuna for a JR train. We managed to squeeze on and by that time it was about 11:00, so I didn’t arrive back in Shinjuku until about 12:30 am.
As I said, the fireworks were great, BUT a bit of an arduous journey back to Tokyo…
Okay…enough whinging…it really was a good display and a fun afternoon & evening with my fireworks chum, Kirk. I managed to get a few good photos too…
You haven’t seen anything until you’ve seen a Japanese beach in August:

Some young women in yukata just prior to the show:

Nice Mount Fuji sunset:

And, of course, some light in the sky:
