Tsugaru Iwaki Skyline

A private toll road up Mount Iwaki with 69 hairpins stacked into a beech-forest climb, one of the most relentlessly switchbacked roads in the world.

From near Dake Onsen on the Hirosaki side, the Tsugaru Iwaki Skyline corkscrews roughly 9 to 10km up the flank of Mount Iwaki, the Tsugaru Fuji, to the eighth station where a chairlift continues toward the summit. The headline is the count of 69 numbered hairpins, each one tight and stacked close on the next, climbing about 800m through beech forest that opens to wide views over the Tsugaru plain. It is a paid road run by a private operator, beautifully surfaced, with average grades around 8 to 9 percent and steeper pinches. Snowfall shuts it from roughly early November to early April. Mind the toll booth and operating hours, the unending blind hairpins, and oncoming traffic on the narrowed switchback apexes.