Melbourne to Adelaide road trip

The best option for a tour of southern Australia (both in terms of the level of attractions, and in terms of the variety of impressions and the number of Australian exotics), is the Melbourne to Adelaide road trip.

The trip from Melbourne to Adelaide along the Southern Ocean coast is the main tour in the south of the Australian continent.

And it’s no wonder.

If you only have a week to explore Australia and want to:

– Visit the maximum number of the most iconic places in Australia this week.
– Enjoy amazing ocean and mountain views, virgin forests, deserts, salt flats and amazing rock formations.
– See “from the inside” and get to know the real, non-calendar Australia.
– Get as close as possible to wild Australian animals in the wild without visiting zoos.
– Taste the freshest seafood and best Australian wines right where the seafood is caught and the wines are made.

To do all this in an exciting, comfortable and harmonious tour of Australia and at the same time, not spend a lot of money on it, then …Your only option is the Great Southern Journey from Melbourne to Adelaide road trip.

Melbourne to Adelaide Road Trip – Description of the tour

Day 1 Melbourne – Warrnambool

The first day of our Melbourne to Adelaide Road Trip we will drive along the famous Great Ocean Road, one of the most scenic highways in the world and the main tourist attraction in Victoria. We will see not only the famous Twelve Apostles Rocks, from where regular day trips return to Melbourne, but also what lies beyond – Loch Ard Gorge and Razor Rock, London Bridge, the Cave, the Bay of witnesses, the bay of islands … there are also several impressive rock formations, the famous shipwreck coast.

And, of course, we will see Australian animals – parrots, koalas, kangaroos, and possibly echidnas… And in winter and spring – whales. For the evening we will stop in Warrnambool, the largest city on the Great Ocean Road. This former whaling center of southern Australia now attracts not die-hard whalers, but curious tourists, as female Southern Right Whales come to these waters in winter to give birth. In addition, the coastal fortifications of the 19th century, built ESPECIALLY to protect against a possible attack by the Russian fleet, have been preserved here!

Day 2. Warnambool – Halls Gap

First, we will descend into the crater of an extinct volcano Tower Hill (Tower Hill), where, as in Conan Doyle’s “Lost World”, you will completely unexpectedly discover a solid isolated piece of the world of Australian wild animals with wallabies. , ostriches, koalas, echidnas and lizards – visible to your eyes just a dozen meters from a noisy highway. No wonder Tower Hill in 1892 became the first national park in the state of Victoria.

North of Warnambool lies the Grampians National Park, an ancient mountain range over 400 million years old. In addition to the magnificent natural views, waterfalls and cliffs, the Grampians attract tourists with their rich wildlife. The Grampians are also an Aboriginal sacred site and contain around 80% of all Aboriginal art. We will spend the night in a mountain valley, in the welcoming village of Halls Gap, among kangaroos, ostriches and deer, and in the morning, we will start our onward journey.

Day 3. Halls Gap – Mount Gambier

After crossing the Grampians the next morning and reaching the Southern Ocean again, we’ll find ourselves at a remote resort at Cape Bridgewater, a crescent-shaped bay formed by the crater rims of another ancient volcano. This is a place of such ideal beauty that you will want to stay here forever. But the most interesting still awaits us ahead – just a few kilometers from this charming bay, an absolutely surreal image – a forest in the ocean. But the forest is not ordinary, but petrified…

The Blue Lake is a volcanic lake with a piercing bright blue color that changes color with the season. In summer it is bright blue and in winter it is usually grey-green. And no one can yet explain how and why this phenomenon occurs.

Sunken Garden – the cave where the roof once failed and a large cave was formed, 500 meters in area. In the late 19th century, an entrepreneurial Australian created a luxurious terraced garden at the bottom of this cave. Then a backlight appeared there, palm trees grew, benches were placed, the walls of the cave were overgrown with weeds… In short, it became wonderful! And everything is underground.

Day 4. Mount Gambia – Kingston SE

Coonawarra is the name of a narrow strip of Red Earth (Terra Rossa), unique in its properties, only 15 kilometers long and 2 wide, which produces the best red wines in Australia. This is one of the most famous wine regions in the world! There are as many as 25 wineries on this tiny piece of land, many of which are open for tasting. In the same place, in the local town of Penola ( Penola), there is also a center dedicated to the first Australian Catholic saint – Mary Makillop (St. Mary of the Cross), who was canonized in Rome only on October 17, 2010. Such, not the most common , neighborhood – a catholic saint among the vines…

Not far from Kunawarra is a UNESCO World Heritage Site – the Naracoorte Caves complex. Along with the Great Barrier Reef and the red rock of Uluru. It is Australia’s most comprehensive palaeontological ‘library’ covering a period of 500,000 years. The road from Narakurt to the Australian lobster capital – Kingston SE (Kingston SE), passes along the so-called Limestone Coast (Limestone Coast) in southern Australia. If you follow to the Australian Red Centre, you will see the roads there are unrealistically red. And along the Limestone Coast, the roads are impossibly white.

Day 5. Kingston SE – Victor Harbor

Today we have to do one and a half hundred kilometers through the completely wild parts of the Coorong National Park (Coorong National Park). Along pelican lagoons and salt lakes, glistening like snow in the hot Australian sun, separating the road from the endless ocean beach. Pass the unlikely gas station ‘in the middle of nowhere’ with its proudly flying Australian flag and the lone shark burger restaurant at Salt Creek, lost among the strip of sand dunes that stretch along the ocean lagoon.

Flocks of pelicans and other waterfowl lazily swim along the shores of Lake Albert, part of Australia’s largest freshwater lake system, in the resort town of Meningie. And just a few tens of kilometers from Meninga, there is a pink salt lake, called Pink Lake. Having made a smooth transition from the salt lakes of the Coorong National Park to the dense vineyards and orchards of the fertile Fleurieu Peninsula by the end of the day, we will overnight in the lovely seaside town of Victor Harbor on the Encounter Bay coast.

Day 6. Victor Harbor – Kangaroo Island

Kangaroo Island is a true natural jewel in southern Australia. It is also called – “Australia in miniature”, or – “zoo without walls”, or – “Noah’s Ark of Australia”. Almost all of the images of Australian wildlife (plus some species unique to the island) are here in a relatively small space. You can also walk along the wonderful ocean beach among the rarest Australian sea lions…

Enchanting ocean landscapes – mighty cliffs, thundering surf, endless ocean expanse, warm white sand beaches and turquoise waters. One such beach on Kangaroo Island, by the way, was recently recognized as the best beach in Australia! Leaving behind the horizon, an evergreen forest and suddenly, a geological wonder – a dazzling white sand beach (Little Sahara). We spend the night in an ecological resort among the forest and wild animals of the Flinders Chase National Park (Flinders Chase National Park).

Day 7 Kangaroo Island – Adelaide

We will spend the first half of the last day of your Melbourne to Adelaide road trip on the same wonderful Kangaroo Island. It’s no coincidence that Kangaroo Island is one of the most popular tourist attractions in South Australia, with around 150,000 tourists visiting it each year (which is quite a lot for a remote island, on a remote mainland!).

It is easy to spend a few more days on Kangaroo Island, but tourists always have a very busy schedule, so after a farewell dinner at the winery, with a great view of the ocean, we will board the ship back to the mainland. Then, not a long journey by car along the fertile Floro Peninsula, and by the evening we already reach the capital of the state of South Australia (South Australia) – Adelaide (Adelaide).

Adelaide is a large, approximately one and a half million inhabitants, a modern and rapidly growing city with a beautiful historic center.

Melbourne to Adelaide road trip – Get a free Quote

Athens Cabs Melbourne provides comfort sedan cars with a personal driver guide for your Tailor Made trip in Melbourne.
Get a free Quote >