On a weekday morning during our 10-day self-drive Hokkaido vacation, my family and I were setting out from our hotel in Asahikawa to Cape Soya (northernmost point in Hokkaido and Japan) when we saw on the media that it was raining heavily at Cape Soya. We did not want to waste our morning drive, and I happened to see World Sheep Museum attraction along the route to Cape Soya, so we decided to go to this off-the-beaten track Museum. We were happy that we did…for a good 2 hours. Getting there: The World Sheep Museum (世界のめん羊館) is located near the top of a hill of a 37-hectare farm at the outskirt west of Shibetsu city. I drove the rental car for about 60 km north of Asahikawa, paid ¥980 ETC toll fee and reached our destination in about 65 minutes with the help of Apple Maps and Google Maps on the Apple Car Play. You could also drive about 2.5 hours from Sapporo to this Museum. Besides the World Sheep Museum, there is also the locally popular Shepherd’s House (Hitsujikai no ie) restaurant at the top of the hill. Both Museum and restaurant have plenty of free parking car park lots. The Museum: We parked our car in front of the single storey circular building that has a “Welcome to Suffolk Land 士别 Shibetsu” stone signboard. We entered the glass door with the “世界のめん羊館” board above it on the left, bought the entrance tickets that cost ¥200 for adults (大人) and ¥100 for primary and secondary school students from the ticket vending machine and then entered the “live” museum through the “見学道路” (translated as “seeing and learning pathway”) door to the right of the vending machine. Next (to the right) to the door is a counter that sells small cute sheep doll at ¥300 per packet and sheep food at ¥100 per packet. According to a notice on the door in Japanese but with clear drawings, do be aware that you should place the sheep food/biscuit on your palm and not holding one piece of food/biscuit between thumb and first finger (in case the aggressive sheep bites your fingers). The “live” Museum has 21 enclosures arranged semi-circularly that keep sheep breeds from Australia (Corriedale), United Kingdom (Southdown, Cheviot, Friesland, Suffolk, Shetland, Jacob, Manx Loghtan), Netherlands (Texel) and Russia (Romanov). Every enclosure has a door or gate leading to the outside which indicates that the healthy sheep are not restricted to within the enclosure all the time (unlike zoo animals). I found most of the sheep are so friendly and gentle and always eager to come to you or welcome you with “baa baa”. We petted the sheep while a few visitors fed them with the sheep feed food. There were kids too who were so thrilled to play and touch the sheep. Upon exiting from the enclosures, we went to the lavatory to wash our hands (do remember to wash). After that, we looked at the information display boards about sheep albeit in Japanese. There is also an interesting display of the wool of 30 breeds of sheep. As there was a slight drizzle, we did not see any sheep while driving past the hilly farmland on our way here. On a day when there is no rain, we would have walked further downhill from the farm and may see the sheep grazing on the hilly farmland. Nevertheless, it is best to check with the Museum staff on the grazing time of the sheep which I am guessing is dependent of the time of the day and weather conditions. While we did not see any grazing sheep on the hills, we did go uphill and ate our lunch at the Hitsujikai no ie Restaurant 羊飼いの家 (Shepherd's House). This restaurant is very popular with the locals and it has a lovely panoramic view of the Museum, farmland and Shibetsu. We ate the famous jingisukan or "Genghis Khan" (ジンギスカン) (hot plate grilled mutton), tonkatsu (Japanese pork cutlets) and deep fried shrimp tempura. All came with rice, radish and miso soup; the servings are generous and the food was delicious. The restaurant also serves curry, barbequed meat and udon etc I enjoyed the following about the World Sheep Museum: (1) This is a great “live” museum with “live” sheep wherein you and I could learn and identify the different sheep breeds and interact up close and personal with them; especially with the rare sheep breeds of Manx Loghtan and Jacob (both sheep breeds with horns) and Shetland (black head and white body); (2) There was hardly any smell from the sheep poop. While we were there in the early afternoon, a dedicated lady staff was using water to clean the enclosures; (3) The sheep are so welcoming of the visitors that we felt so at home and at ease with them; (4) Hardly any visitors – I counted 10 visitors throughout the one hour while we were there, even though it was a public holiday (Respect for the Aged Day); I hoped the management could improve on the following: (1) More English translation of the information (2) More learning information about the sheep e.g. fun facts, habitats, food, purpose of rearing sheep etc. My family and I really enjoyed our time here. I could never imagine that there is a world sheep museum in Hokkaido let alone Japan! Moreover, if you are looking at a cool and less-visited attraction in Hokkaido, then the World Sheep Museum is the place! Depending on the season, visitors can do wool spinning, create artwork using wool and watch a shearing show or a sheepdog show. It would be so much fun especially for the children.