Karatsu Kunchi — luxury itineraries and concierge.

Karatsu Kunchi, from an operator's side.

Karatsu Kunchi belongs to Karatsu Shrine and runs on 2, 3 and 4 November. The hikiyama floats are the draw: towering constructions of lacquered papier-mache, red and gold, each owned by a district and pulled through the streets by ropes and shouting. The set piece is on the middle day, when the floats are hauled off the road and dragged across the soft sand of the Nishinohama shore to the temporary shrine — a slow, heavy, genuinely difficult piece of work that is the reason people travel for this one. Karatsu is a small town, and that is the whole problem.

• The sand haul on 3 November is the moment worth attending and it draws a crowd the beachfront was never built for, so position has to be taken early in the day rather than found at the time.
• Karatsu has very little accommodation of any standard and none at a luxury level, so the file is really a Fukuoka file with a transfer attached.
• Early November is autumn colour season across Kyushu and the northern Kyushu rooms and vehicles are contested by demand that has nothing to do with the festival.

Basing decides the file.

Fukuoka is the honest base — roughly an hour and a half by road, with real luxury rooms at the end of the night. Karatsu's own inventory is small and modest, and where a file needs the short walk home we take it and set expectations about the room in advance rather than after arrival.

When to start.

Six to nine months for Fukuoka rooms and the vehicle, longer if the itinerary also wants Kyushu's better onsen ryokan in autumn. The festival dates never move; the autumn season around them is what tightens.