This year's 10-day Golden Week holiday, straddling the soon-to-be-ended Heisei era and the upcoming Reiwa era, started on Saturday.
Stations and airports were crowded from the morning, with people heading to such locations as their hometowns or overseas, and traffic congestion began to develop on highways.
According to the Japan Railway companies, reserved seats were nearly sold out for both inbound and outbound Tokaido Shinkansen trains from Saturday morning. On some outbound trains, the occupancy rate of non-reserved seats reached 150 percent.
There were many travelers at Tokyo Station, including families. Mai Tsunekawa, a 9-year-old girl from Adachi Ward, Tokyo, was traveling to Aichi Prefecture, where her grandmother lives. "I want to play in a park," she said with a smile.
Her 41-year-old father, Akinobu, said, "We can plan various travels, because we have a long vacation."
Traffic was congested for 15 kilometers around Isehara Junction on the outbound Tomei Expressway in Kanagawa Prefecture and for 13 kilometers around the Adatara Service Area on the outbound Tohoku Expressway in Fukushima Prefecture at 1:00 p.m. on Saturday, according to the Japan Road Traffic Information Center.
Many travelers were also seen in the city of Dazaifu, which is connected to the new era Reiwa, in Fukuoka Prefecture. The new era's name was derived from a poem in "Manyoshu," the oldest existing collection of waka Japanese poems, the poem that is believed to have been written at a party at a residence of the poet Otomo no Tabito (665-731), who worked for the Dazaifu government.
On Saturday morning, many people came to Sakamoto Hachimangu shrine, believed to be the former location of the poet's residence. Families and other visitors took commemorative photos with a framed piece of paper bearing the characters for Reiwa, prepared by a group of the shrine's parishioners.
"I felt solemn at this shrine surrounded by greenery. I hope we pass through the Reiwa era brightly and peacefully, like the Heisei era," said Tomoki Ideta, a 45-year-old company employee from Kitakyushu in the prefecture.
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