Hamamatsu Kite Festival is also called Hamamatsu Festival. Hamamatsu Kite Festival held from May 3 to May 5 each year, includes a "Tako Gassen", or kite fight, and luxuriously decorated palace-like floats. The festival originated about 430 years ago, when the lord of Hamamatsu Castle celebrated the birth of his first son by flying kites. In the Meiji Era, the celebration of the birth of a first son by flying "Hatsu Dako", or the first kite, became popular, and this tradition has survived in the form of Hamamatsu Kite Festival. During the nights of Hamamatsu Kite Festival, people parade downtown carrying over 70 "yatai", or palace-lake floats, that are beautifully decorated while playing Japanese traditional festival music. The festival reaches its peak when groups representing the city's various districts compete by energetically marching through the downtown streets.