How to get to Adelaide

By car

Adelaide is at least a day’s drive away from capital cities on the Australian east coast. The shortest route from Adelaide to Melbourne takes eight to nine hours. Roads are all paved, and there are some freeway sections, but it is mostly two lane roads of reasonable quality.

• Melbourne – Adelaide = 736 km via Horsham (National Highway 8 ) or 901 km via Mt Gambier (National Highway 1)
• Sydney – Adelaide = 1422 km via Wagga Wagga and Mildura (National Highway 20) or 1659 km via Broken Hill (National Highway 32). The road through Wagga will save you some hours due to freeway most of the way from Sydney to Wagga, and the fast straight road from Wagga past Hay. The road through Broken Hill is perhaps the more interesting route, however.
• Adelaide – Brisbane = 2031 km via Broken Hill

By plane

Adealaide airport is around 7km to the west of downtown. West Beach, and excellent swimming beach with plenty of accommodation is located only 4km away.

Adelaide’s airport has regular international connections to Auckland (Air New Zealand), Hong Kong (Cathay Pacific), Denpasar (Pacific Blue), Nadi (Pacific Blue), Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia Airlines) and Singapore (Singapore Airlines & Qantas) as well as domestic connections to many Australian cities. Budget airlines Virgin Blue, Jetstar and Tiger Airways offer the cheapest domestic airfares.

There is only a single terminal for international and domestic departures, and transfers are seamless.

The airport has ATM, currency change, food, shopping and lockers. Free Wi-Fi is available throughout the terminal.

Between the airport and the city

The public JetBus services the airport, connecting airport and the city around every 15 minutes for most of the day. A ticket costs $4.40 during peak/$2.20 off-peak, and includes unlimited transfers within a 2 hours period. The city center can be reached with 15-25 minutes.

Skylink Adelaide operates a regular service to most traveler specified destinations within the CBD area from the airport, for example hotel drop off. The service is $8/$3.50, and services also run out to Keswick Interstate Railway Terminal ($4).

Taxis are available outside the terminal, at around $16 to the city centre (three people in a taxi to a hotel in the city is cheaper than the Skylink).

Rental cars are available.

By train

Great Southern Railway runs long-distance tourist train services, The Ghan runs to Alice Springs and Darwin, The Overland, runs to Melbourne, and the Indian Pacific runs to Perth, Broken Hill and Sydney. These journeys are train experiences, and offer sleepers, and the opportunity to take your car with you on the train. However, they take considerably longer and invariably cost more than the journey by bus or plane.

VLine runs a daily combined bus/train journey to Adelaide from Melbourne. You can connect from NSW Countrylink trains to connecting Vline buses at Albury or Benalla.