Although in Japan they don’t quite celebrate Christmas like we do – it is more of a romantic holiday then a family holiday since that’s what they do for New Year’s while we tend to focus more on friends and romantic partners for New Year’s – they do have holiday lights. When I was in Hiroshima at the end of December, I took a walk in the evening during my brief stay there to enjoy their free winter illuminations. Now I’m sharing them with you.
Here is a holiday tree by the mall right next to my hotel in Hiroshima. If you stay in Hiroshima I really liked my hotel, the RIHGA Royal Hotel Hiroshima, thanks to its easy walking distance to Hiroshima Castle, Hiroshima Museum of Art, this mall and the Hiroshima Bus Center (which also had a food court area) were right next door so gave me easy access to two more floors of restaurants besides the 8 within the hotel.
Of course the hotel itself had its own Christmas tree too. Notice how both of these trees are so perfectly set up for a photo for… one? One pair of wings, and one chair?
Along Peace Boulevard that had parks between the streets Hiroshima had just set up the Hiroshima Dreamination. According to the brochure I found in the hotel lobby, the display includes 1.4 million LED lights
So after a business dinner, I took my co-worker along with me to walk the illuminations! Extra props for the staff here at the hotel who saw me looking at the sheet and showing it to my co-worker and looking up how to get there on my phone, and after confirming what I was doing she brought up a simplified English printed map of the area they must have for tourists and drew us directions to save me the time and trouble. I love that I didn’t have to ask she just observed and pro-actively helped.
So now onto the Hiroshima Dreamination. Both my coworker and I were only armed with our smartphones, but I can imagine with a real camera you could take some pretty great photos. First we encountered the Rainbow Tree area which besides the namesake tree (and how you don’t need to be an evergreen to be a holiday tree), there were lots of hearts in the decor perfect for the kind of photos you ask someone else in your group or strangers to take of you? Because the photo needs to be taken from several yards away, longer then your arm or a selfie stick could go…?
There were multiple sets of these seats scattered for… one or two?
Next we encountered what the map dubbed the Music Garden area which did have music playing and the lights would dance turning on and off in time to the beat of the instrumental happy music. It also had a tunnel you could walk through which because of the number of bright lights made it much easier for selfies.
The next area, Happy Land, included a lights that were build to look like a train and lots of miscellaneous fun shapes and characters.
OK, the next area is called Recalled Phoenix. I understand the phoenix light sculpture, but the spiderweb… I have no idea. Because it goes with the color scheme of the red?
This next area, Peace Island, which was full of hearts and paper crane shapes, was one of my favorite sections.
At this point, we turned around and crossed to the other side of the boulevard and were making our way back on the same street, just on the other side to see the other side’s lighting areas.
The next area, the Red Spirits area, was very devoted to the local baseball team, the Hiroshima Toyo Carp. There were not as many lights here but lots of large cutouts where you could pose in front of the various players (which of course I didn’t know) and seemed to be a big hit with many of the people here. I only took a photo of the hat and mascot.
The Big Wave area featured a very cool whale and ship.
Next was an area called Yggdrasil which was grounded by a large lit tree, and then another area the map called Frozen Castle. The Wikipedia entry on Hiroshima Dreamination refers to a Protective god Dragon area and Snowfield of auroras area so I wonder if its’ a translation problem? Even the above area the wiki calls Sailing ship of healing instead…?
It’s pretty great the city makes this type of area for its residents and tourists to enjoy right? I particularly like that it’s more then just a holiday tree, that it has areas of different themes to spread people out and encourage them to take a walk.
Then, Buggy on Ice finished it off until an area of green lights on trees – Dreami Forest – which bookends both parts of the boulevard.
Thanks for reading/scanning and happy holidays to you from me! If you are in Japan during November and December, it is worth investigating if the city offers some sort of winter illumination display. It may even be a free show like the ones I have witnessed. This one in Hiroshima is an annual display they create – I’ve also shared in a previous post and trips in Japan previous winter illuminations.
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