TAKAYAMA CITY & FIREWORKS

over the weekend we went to takayama with an american family we met at church one day.

they invited us to tag along, and it was soooo much fun!

we first went to a whole shopping district with all kinds of little shops and fun things. 

^^bri may have bought me a birthday surprise in there

we haven't had mochi this whole time while living in Japan and we found a little shop selling them with free samples. so, we had to buy our own and bought a delicious looking raspberry kind...mixed with green tea and it was SO disgusting! i took one bite and i was done.

after walking around for a few hours we got delicious burgers that, of course, tasted like home!

then we went to a place called "hida village" that had really old houses with amazing architecture.

the houses were all from the 1800's, we got to walk around inside and see what everything was used for. 

^^here's the wong family we went with and they have the cutest kids ever! they are 4 and 3 & there were so many fun little games to keep them, and us, entertained. 

after hida village we hit up a delicious ramen shop, picked up some of their friends and headed to fireworks. 

there is no holiday being celebrated for the need of the fireworks, they just do it every year for fun....

and they were like no fireworks we have ever seen in our lives!!!!

the fireworks were shown above a massive river in Gifu and there were thousands of people there to watch. 

the fireworks started before the sun went down and we were so confused why they were starting so early...and then we realized they had to start so early because the show was 2 hours. 

(my hands are not very photogenic)

the fireworks were so unreal! we decided that this one show combined every firework show we've ever seen in our whole lives. 

you know the "grand finale" watching fireworks, that didn't exist because every firework shown was the grand finale....for two hours!

& the fireworks were like nothing we have ever seen, leave it to Japan to have the coolest fireworks to ever exist. 

the fireworks were pretty far away from us so it wasn't as crowded where we were sitting.

all of the sudden, it scared us at first, tons of fireworks started to go off in front of us while the other fireworks were going off too!

right after that boats started to go across the river in front of us with huge fiery lanterns.

they had huge birds tied on a rope, they would dunk the birds in the water, have them catch fish, bring them up and choke the fish out of them! it was amazing to watch them pass right in front of us. 

this boat decided to park right in front of where we were all sitting and watch the fireworks, it was pretty funny.  

this was such an amazing night, and i don't think we'll ever see fireworks like we did tonight.

(we even left early cause it was just so long). 

the wongs were so much fun to be around and we were so happy we could tag along with their little family adventure.