Adelaide Hills

The road

The Adelaide Hills sit directly behind the city and hold some of the best driving roads within 30 minutes of any Australian capital. This loop links the highlights into a single circuit that starts and finishes in the CBD. Head east from Adelaide on Gorge Road through Athelstone and into the hills. Gorge Road is used by car manufacturers for standardised vehicle testing - the long sweeping downhill section after Torrens Hill Road is perfectly cambered and reveals more about a car's handling than most test tracks. From Gorge Road turn south onto Corkscrew Road, which climbs through four dramatic switchbacks gaining 250 metres in 3.7 kilometres. The gradient averages nearly seven per cent and the switchbacks are tight enough to require genuine commitment. From Corkscrew the route follows Montacute Road along the ridgeline, through the wine and orchard country around Basket Range, before descending via Norton Summit Road back towards the city. Norton Summit Road is the classic Adelaide Hills descent - narrow, cambered, fast enough to be engaging and lined with the stone walls that mark the oldest vineyards in the hills. The whole loop covers about 65 kilometres and takes 80 minutes without stops. Every section has a different character.

The region

The Adelaide Hills are a low range immediately east of the Adelaide CBD, rising to about 700 metres at their highest point. The hills were settled early in South Australia's colonial history and the wine industry here predates almost every other region in the country. Hahndorf, Australia's oldest surviving German settlement, sits in the central hills. The mix of vineyards, orchards, eucalypt forest and heritage towns gives the driving a varied visual quality that changes every few kilometres. The Targa Adelaide rally has used roads in these hills for years, which has kept the surfaces well-maintained and the corners well-known among driving enthusiasts.

Before you go

Fuel in Adelaide before starting. The hills towns of Norton Summit, Basket Range and Lobethal have limited services. The roads are fully sealed throughout. The loop works in either direction but clockwise (Gorge Road first, Norton Summit last) gives the better sequence of corners. Winter mornings bring frost to the upper sections above 500 metres. Weekend mornings are popular with cyclists on Gorge Road and Norton Summit Road - give them room. The Basket Range section has several cellar doors if you want to turn the drive into a longer outing.

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