Prayer requires a helmet here

In partnership with

Still making plans for Chinese New Year (Lunar New Year)? Today’s option is only for the insane brave.
- Cris

The Most Dangerous Lunar New Year on Earth

Why You Need a Helmet to Pray in Yanshui

Forget the gentle lion dances and the polite exchange of red envelopes in your local Chinatown. If you want the real Lunar New Year experience - the kind that requires signing a mental liability waiver - you need to get to Tainan, Taiwan, for the Lantern Festival between March 3-16.

Welcome to the Yanshui Beehive Fireworks Festival, perhaps the only religious ceremony on the planet where the mandatory dress code is "full body armor" and the objective is to get shot.

Adventure outside the ordinary

What happens when one of the most trusted specialty outdoor retailers, REI Co-op, teams up with the world's largest travel company, Intrepid Travel? You get a unique collection of active trips that offer meaningful, immersive travel experiences in the outdoors.

It’s travel inspired by REI, operated by Intrepid. Think community farm stays in Costa Rica, camping in Joshua Tree’s wild backcountry, cycling in Peru’s Sacred Valley, or sleeping in mountain huts before summiting Mount Kilimanjaro.

So, where will you go? Explore more than 85 destinations worldwide with a small group of up to 16, and an expert local leader who’ll help you to truly experience the destination.

REI Co-op members save 15% on REI Exclusive trips and receive a 20% off coupon to use at REI Co-op after booking REI Recommended trips.

Find your next adventure

_{For T&Cs and to view the full collection of trips in 85+ destinations, visit rei.com/travel.}

While the rest of the world celebrates the New Year by launching fireworks up into the night sky, the residents of Yanshui have spent the last 130 years aiming them horizontally, directly into crowds of tens of thousands of people. It is outrageous, borderline negligent, and easily one of the most insane travel experiences on earth.

The centerpieces of this madness are the "beehives" ( pao cheng). These are massive wooden racks, sometimes towering two stories high, loaded with anywhere from 10,000 to upwards of 400,000 bottle rockets. These aren't whimsical sparklers; they are tightly packed munitions wired together to ignite almost simultaneously.

Going Somewhere? Protect Your Trip (and Your Sanity)

Here is the truly scandalous part to the uninitiated outsider: this chaos is a sacred act. The tradition began in the late 19th century as a desperate measure to ward off a devastating cholera plague. The villagers believed the noise and fire of the rockets would scare away the evil spirits causing the disease. It worked (likely because the people scattered), and the tradition stuck.

Today, a palanquin carrying the statue of Guan Yu, the God of War, is carried through the streets. The beehives are ignited only when the god approaches, effectively offering him a salute of high-velocity explosives. For the participants, the goal is survival of the baptism by fire. Getting hit by a rocket is considered a profound blessing for the coming year. In Yanshui, the more painful your evening, the luckier your future. (Maybe I’m ok with my bad luck).

Stepping into the "firing zone" feels less like a cultural festival and more like a civil unrest drill. You are packed shoulder-to-shoulder with adrenaline junkies, all looking like budget astronauts in taped-up motorcycle helmets, thick flame-retardant jackets, and towels wrapped around necks to stop errant rockets from sliding down shirts.

When a massive hive ignites, the world disappears. You are engulfed in choking sulfur smoke and the deafening, shrieking whistle of thousands of rockets firing per minute. You don't see them coming; you just feel the incessant thwack-thwack-thwack against your helmet visor and the searing heat whizzing past your legs. It is absolute, terrifying chaos. Luck, I suppose, is both surviving the blessing and being blessed?

The morning after, your ears will be ringing, your expensive GORE-TEX jacket will look like Swiss cheese, and you will likely have several scorch marks as souvenirs. But you’ll have survived the wildest religious ritual in existence. It’s a festival that shouldn't legally be allowed to exist, which is exactly why you have to see it once.

During the lantern festival, I will be sitting at home, sipping chamomile tea, grateful that no one is shooting rockets at me.

See you next Wednesday.

What did you think of Espresso Boarding?

Was this forwarded to you? Sign up to receive your own copy.
It’s free to subscribe.

Looking for previous destinations? They are safely located here.