MIE –
About 240 folks gathered earlier than daybreak on June 21 at Futami Okitama Shrine in Ise, Mie Prefecture, to hope for good well being throughout a summer time solstice ritual held in entrance of the Meoto Iwa rocks.
The summer time solstice, the day with the longest interval of daylight within the 12 months, is marked on the shrine with the annual Summer Solstice Festival, wherein individuals worship the dawn between the paired rocks and pray for defense from sickness over the approaching 12 months.
Participants started gathering at 3:30 a.m. and, after receiving purification rites on the shrine’s essential corridor, entered the ocean and waited in seawater as much as their knees for the solar to rise.
Clouds coated the sky round dawn shortly earlier than 5 a.m., stopping individuals from seeing the solar, however the ritual went forward as they supplied prayers from the shoreline.
Source: CBC