Hakone Turnpike and Lake Ashi

A 213 km loop

Open this ride in the planner →

Why this ride

A proper escape from Tokyo with roads worth waking up for. Out of Tokyo and back again: 213 km, roughly 3 h 53 in the saddle. The line favours views over speed.

Roadbook

1. Tokyo start

   Every ride from Tokyo begins with a negotiation. The roads are good and the drivers are disciplined, but traffic lights are many and the pace is steady rather than fast, so patience is part of the toolkit. A Sunday dawn is the easiest time to slip away.

   Tokyo is a city of more than thirteen million, and the metropolitan area around it is the largest in the world. It was once the fishing village of Edo, and it became the seat of the Tokugawa shogunate in the early seventeenth century, then Japan's capital in 1868. That history is visible in odd places: a small shrine tucked between apartment blocks, a stretch of old canal, a temple with incense drifting over a car park. For a rider, it is worth looking up between traffic lights.

   Practicalities are simple, because everything is close. Fuel stations are everywhere, with attendants at many of them, and the city's convenience stores sell hot coffee, rice balls and sandwiches at any hour. The expressways are tolled, and an electronic toll card makes them smoother, though paying at the booth works. Parking for motorcycles is trickier than in many places, so choose a hotel with a bike space in advance and check the rules before leaving the bike anywhere on the street.

   Once you reach the open road, the contrast is striking. Heading south-west along the coast toward the Izu Peninsula, the landscape changes from concrete to hills, tangerine groves and sea views, with Mount Fuji appearing on clear days. The best time to ride is autumn, when the air is dry and cool and the visibility is highest, and spring, when the cherry blossom runs up the coast. Summer is hot and humid, and the rainy season in June can be grey and heavy, so pack proper waterproofs.

2. Hakone food

   Hakone is where Tokyo goes to get away from itself. The mountain resort sits in the caldera of an old volcano southwest of the capital, about an hour and a half by road without traffic, with Lake Ashi in the middle and Fuji looming to the northwest on a good day. Odawara, on the coast below, is the practical town, with its castle and its fish markets, while the hot-spring villages scattered through the hills have catered to travellers for centuries. The old Tokaido highway crossed these mountains, and you can still walk stretches of its stone-paved surface and see a reconstructed checkpoint beside the lake, where officials of the Tokugawa shogunate once inspected every traveller's papers.

   On a bike, the draw is the mountain road. The Hakone Turnpike climbs from the coast in a long run of bends, open and smooth, with good visibility and a toll that keeps heavy trucks away. The Skyline and the roads around the crater rim offer views over the lake and the Pacific. Expect weekend crowds of cars and motorcycles, especially on fine autumn days, and be careful in fog, which rolls into the caldera quickly and can drop the temperature several degrees. Winter mornings can bring ice on the higher sections.

   Landscape matters here as much as the road. Owakudani, the steaming valley of sulphur vents above the lake, is the remains of a violent eruption roughly three thousand years ago, and the smell of rotten eggs drifts across the road. Locals boil eggs in the hot pools there until the shells turn black, and tell you each one adds seven years to your life. The pampas grass fields of Sengokuhara turn silver in autumn, and the cedar avenue along the old highway is cool and dark even in midsummer.

   Fuel is straightforward, with stations in Odawara and along the main road up the valley, but the mountain sections have fewer, so fill at the bottom. Konbini stores at the lakeside and along the turnpike sell hot drinks and snacks. A cup of coffee at a mountain cafe, with the lake and the trees outside, is a decent reward after the climb.

   Come on a weekday if you can, and early. By midday the lake road is slow, and by evening the mist often comes back down.

3. Tokyo finish

Where this sits

Rides near here