Kurobe Unazuki Canyon Route黒部宇奈月キャニオンルート

The tour starts where the sightseeing torokko ends. At Keyakidaira you change to a works tram that runs 500 m into the tunnel in 3 minutes. The rails connect all the way to Unazuki, so freight wagons can run straight through. JTB opened a lounge on the station’s second floor on 1 October 2026 for the security check, helmets, drinks and, on some courses, lunch.

Installed in 1939 because the slope was too steep for track, and for a time the largest height difference of any lift in Japan. It rises 200 m in 2 minutes. The floor carries rails so a wagon can roll straight in, and it is wet and slippery at the bottom, so mind the rail grooves.

A 5-minute walk from the top station leads to the shaft lookout, with Okukane-yama (奥鐘山, 1,543 m) straight ahead and Hakuba-Yarigatake, which you cannot see from Keyakidaira station. Course B does not include this lookout.

A battery locomotive takes you 6.5 km in 32 minutes through the 高熱隧道. When it was dug in the 1930s the rock passed 160°C and dynamite went off by itself. The rock is still about 40°C, and you feel the heat and smell sulphur from inside the car.

Past the tunnel the train stops at Sennindani on a steel bridge 859 m above sea level, with Sennindani Dam in front and the 165 m Kumokiri Falls (雲切の滝) behind.

The upper railway ends at Kurobegawa No. 4 Power Station, built entirely underground because it sits in a national park. You then ride the incline, finished in 1959 to carry equipment for the station: 815 m long at 34°, 20 minutes up or down. Digging a long, steep shaft like this had no precedent anywhere in the world, according to the route’s own history.

From the top of the incline a private electric bus runs 10.2 km through the Kurobe Tunnel, which has five side tunnels. At Taru-zawa the bus stops and you walk to a lookout at the mouth of the side tunnel for Ura-Tsurugi (裏剱), Mount Tsurugi seen from the side that climbers see, with the glacier on its snow gully, which the route bills as the southernmost in the Far East. You see it on a clear day only.

The route comes out at Kurobe Dam. Courses A and B end here, and you carry on down the Alpine Route toward Tateyama on your own. Courses C and D run the other way and arrive at Keyakidaira, where the torokko takes you down to Unazuki.