It was a drizzly morning in Fukuoka and while the city was still asleep I started heading west towards Saikai National Park in Nagushiyama on the way to Sasebo, my next stop.

Took road 202 and 204 all the way to Matsuura which offers great coastal and countryside views. Right before entering the city of Karatsu (Saga prefecture), the road crosses the forest of the Black Pines of Nijinomatsubara which is definitely the highlight of this road.

At the doors of Nagasaki prefecture, the sun started to shine and a dark and narrow jungly road brought me all the way up to Saikai National Park. It is located 234 meters above the sea level and offers astonishing postcard-like views of all the islets that lay near the shoreline:

Here is a link of the exact road where I took this video:

After this wonderful sunset I started heading to Sasebo. The road that goes down from Nagushiyama was built between rice terraces and it followed by road 18, which goes along the coast passing by tiny local fishing towns.

15 kilometers before reaching Sasebo, Japan had another surprise awaiting. Literally in the middle of nowhere, by the river and a few factories there were hundreds of cars and trucks parked surrounding a huge and flashy building. It was a Mega Pachinko center. Pachinko would be the equivalent of slot machines back home but with few different features. I was told by the staff that there were more than a thousand machines inside. (In a standard Pachinko in Tokyo there are around 100 to 200 machines.)

Contrasts are a big thing in Japan and they always go far beyond your imagination.

The journey from Fukuoka to Sasebo including the detour ended up being 140km long and took about 4 hours.