All hail Elizabeth

The Kanamara Festival (aka Penis Festival) is held on the first Sunday every year (although the festival wasn't held during the pandemic). The heavens smiled down on the festival and despite it raining early in the morning, the skies cleared up and temps rose around the time the festivities were starting. 

The line to the Kanayama Shine, where the revered "penis" god is housed, was insanely long. I think there were more people out this year than last year. Since everybody was at the Kanayama Shrine, I took advantage of this and went to the other famous shine in the area, the Kawasaki Taishi Shrine. This is the major shrine that people visit, especially during New Year. 

It was great not having to weave in and out of the crowd just to get across the street. There's a path leading to the shrine lined with shops, mostly selling candy and other sweets, and of course, the strawberry-flavored penis and pussy candies were out on display. 

Only in Japan will you see people of all ages sucking on pink dick out in broad daylight LOL To be fair, the candy is rather tasty. 

Another thing out on display were dildos made out of semi-precious gems. Anybody interested in a rose quartz dildo? It'll set you back around $50-80, depending on the exchange rate (8,800JPY). There's only one size, tho. 

I managed to score a relatively good spot to watch the parade. Last year, I was at the shrine entrance where the parade started, but I didn't think I'd get a good spot like that, seeing how insanely crowded it was. 

These are the vids I took this year. I had to break down the original into parts since it was too big to upload. 

 

   

These are vids I took last year. I got a better shot of "Elizabeth" (the huge pepto bismol pink penis). 

  

Last year, the Kanayama Shrine cleared out when the parade started, but that was most certainly not the case this year! The line to get into the shrine grounds was still insane! The grounds at this shrine is only a fraction of the size of the Kawasaki Taishi. There's really not much to see, either, except maybe the huge wood made out of wood? It wasn't out last year, but maybe they brought it out this year. I was like, uh, no, when I saw just how crowded it was. It would have been nice to get close to take pics of the cherry blossoms, but maybe some other time. 

I worked up an appetite after walking around all morning long browsing the sights. I found an interesting diner with foreign staff and the Japanese staff spoke English. The food was standard Japanese diner fare and I ordered a rice ball lunch set. It was pretty good. The staff there were super friendly. I'd probably go there again if I'm in the area. One of the shops at the Kawasaki Taishi served white sesame seed ice cream. It was pretty good, but some of the ground sesame decided to fall down my shirt, so I smelled like sesame seeds every time I looked down. LOL 

Although I went by myself this year, it was fun. All in all, it was a good weekend.