Day 3 - Yamaguchi - 11 Dec 2016

We set off at about 10am. Today is the day that we started our self-drive. Toyota Corolla Axio would be taking us round Japan for the next few days.

Our first stop was at Dazaifu Tenmangu Shrine. There were lots of visitors at the shrine. While walking within the shrine's compound, we watched a show by a man who made his monkey performed various tricks such as walking on stilts and climbing up a pole. After admiring the shrine's architecture, we made our way to Kyushu National Museum (located within Dazaifu). However, we were met with the lure of a mini theme park just next to it. The kids had the final say and therefore, we ended up in the mini theme park. The kids had such a great time at the park. They were in their kind of world, exploring the the carousel, the "sky ship" and the bumper car rides, amongst many other exciting things to do. If not for the "intervention" of lunch, I believe they would have gone on for a couple of more hours.

After our lunch at a restaurant within Dazaifu, we set off for our next destination - Kokura Castle - at about 230pm. It was a 2 hour drive and by the time we arrived at 430pm, the entrance to the castle was already closed. That didn't stop us from hanging around outside the castle to take some nice pictures of the beautiful red and yellow autumn trees. The kids even created some fun by gathering a pile of leaves and hurling them up the air. Mei Han even suggested that we posed for pictures with the kids throwing the autumn leaves at us to create an artistic effect of the photos.

En route to our hotel at Smile Hotel Shimonoseki, we stopped by a park with playground for the kids. Even though it was for only half an hour, I believe it definitely had added to their happiness tanks.

Smile hotel is a hotel near the train station. Thus, there isn't any parking facilities within the hotel. We were lost trying to search for the hotel's carpark which is located about five minutes drive away. Thankfully, we had dropped off some of our heavier luggages at the hotel, knowing this fact. After making a few wrong turns, we eventually managed to locate the carpark.

Dinner time. And that was our last activity for the day. We settled for our dinner at a nearby restaurant. After dinner, all of us checked in at the hotel and headed for our respective rooms.