7 Of the Best Free Things To Do In Adelaide City

How to see the best of the Festival City without spending a dollar.

Adelaide’s meticulously planned city centre is easy to navigate, especially with the free City Connector bus and tram that link the major attractions. And with a little planning, it’s possible to visit many of the city’s best sights without opening your wallet. Here are the best free things to do in Adelaide city.

1. Taste the local produce at Adelaide Central Market

Adelaide’s culinary landscape has come forward in leaps and bounds over the last decade, but if you can’t afford a seat at the ultra-fancy restaurants you can still visit the scene’s beating heart for free. With over 70 traders the undercover Adelaide Central Market has everything from karkalla kimchi to espresso-rubbed Italian cheese. Visit on a Tuesday, Thursday, Friday or Saturday and you’ll find the hall filled with colour and the clamour of voices as fruit and veg vendors hawk their wares to busy shoppers, and many of them have free samples for the curious.

a colourful mural at a dining spot in the Adelaide Central Market — Adelaide Central Market is popular for its vibrant art and food scene. (Image: South Australian Tourism Commission)

If you still have room afterwards, head to the family-owned Haigh’s Chocolates on the CBD’s southern outskirts to learn how they make their premium chocolates. They’ll take you through the entire production process from starting with ethically farmed cocoa beans to finished product, with a few tastings along the way.

Chocolate freckles being made at Haigh's Chocolates in Adelaide — Pop in for the daily tastings at Haigh’s Chocolates. (Image: Tourism Australia / South Australia Tourism Commission)

2. Visit old (and new) cultural hubs

The grand South Australian Museum houses the largest collection of Aboriginal artefacts in the world, with over 3000 items on display alongside a broad range of natural and cultural history exhibits. It sits on cultural boulevard North Terrace, flanked by the State Library (home to the stunning mid-Victorian Mortlock Wing) and Art Gallery of South Australia , which has a broad collection of historical and contemporary art and the permanent exhibitions at all three are free.

Mortlock Wing inside the South Australian State Library — The State Library is home to the stunning mid-Victorian Mortlock Wing. (Image: Jake Wundersitz)

A short walk away, Tandanya National Aboriginal Cultural Institute draws its name from the Kaurna name for Adelaide (Tarndanyangga). Australia’s oldest Aboriginal-owned and managed multi-arts centre, it hosts regular exhibitions and events while the APY Gallery on Light Square provides a city home for artists from remote APY communities to work and exhibit.

Tandayaculturalcentre — Tandanya is Australia’s oldest Aboriginal-owned and managed multi-arts centre

3. Visit Adelaide’s best beaches

With more than 30 kilometres of continuous coastline, Adelaide has no shortage of great beaches. Glenelg is the most easily accessible thanks to a regular tram service and has plenty of sand for sunbathing or volleyball. But head slightly further afield and you’ll find some breathtakingly beautiful spots that are far less crowded.

Aerial shot of the Moseley Beach Club at sunset, Glenelg Beach — Sip cocktails in Glenelg at Moseley Beach Club. (Image: Hayley Hays Photography)

Watch the sun setting over the ocean with a cocktail in hand at Henley’s Seamore (granted, not free but the views are priceless) or enjoy the white sandy beach and gentle swell of Brighton, where George the sea lion is an occasional visitor. Further south, Port Noarlunga has a reef close to the jetty that’s perfect for snorkelling and you can float downstream beneath rugged sandstone cliffs at the nearby Onkaparinga river mouth.

Drink overlooking Henleys Beach at Seamores — The drinks aren’t free but the views are priceless from Seamore at Henley Beach. (Image: Duy Dash)

4. Check out Port Adelaide

Forecasting the revitalisation of Port Adelaide is something of a state sport in South Australia, but a range of new openings in the past few years means that the dockside area is finally emerging from its decades-long slumber.

Pirate Life ’s huge new brewery and taphouse provides a focal point, just as Little Creatures’ venue does in Fremantle, and within a few minutes’ walk you’ll find locally run art galleries and mural-covered walls courtesy of the annual Wonderwalls Festival . Walk along the Port River and you’ll pass through the Adelaide Dolphin Sanctuary , where you might spot the only wild city-dwelling dolphins in the world.

Woman admires a mural in Port Adelaide Wonderwalls Festival — Locate the mural-covered walls courtesy of the annual Wonderwalls Festival in Port Adelaide. (Image: Jimmy C)

5. Attend an iconic Adelaide festival

South Australia didn’t earn the nickname ‘the festival state’ by accident. Things reach a peak in February and ‘Mad March’ when the Fringe and Adelaide Festival bring massive outdoor pop-up venues and hundreds of shows each night. Adelaide Writers’ Week and WOMADelaide also fall in this manic period but the calendar is full of events year-round.

Views of a stage at WOMADelaide — Arrive for festival season and soak up the atmosphere and range of free and paid events. (Image: WOMADelaide)

Food and drink festivals Tasting Australia and Beer & BBQ Festival celebrate local and international culinary heroes, while sporting fans are catered to with events like the Tour Down Under . These are joined by a stacked roster of cultural festivals including OzAsia , Tarnanthi , Feast and the Adelaide Film Festival , guitar and cabaret festivals (plus Cabaret Fringe ).

6. Check out Adelaide’s music scene

Walk down Rundle Street during the Fringe festival and there’s a good chance a desperate young performer will be handing out free tickets to avoid the embarrassment of an empty house. But you can catch gigs for free year-round in the UNESCO City Of Music. Billy Bob’s BBQ Jam is a local institution, a long-running open mic night every Monday at the much-loved Grace Emily Hotel that draws local legends and touring acts alike (Marlon Williams played an unofficial set there recently). The similarly old-school Exeter Hotel on Rundle Street has live music most nights, and afternoon gigs in the beer garden on weekends.

7. Hike Adelaide’s trails

Adelaide is a city literally surrounded by parks – the CBD is completely encompassed by the heritage-listed Park Lands. With over 750 hectares, there are plenty of green spaces to explore, but venture a little further and you can get an even better view along one of Adelaide’s many hikes.

Mount Lofty Summit is a popular drive (or weekend cycle) and offers sweeping views over the Adelaide plains and the Gulf of St Vincent. It’s also accessible by bus, and the nearby cool-climate Mount Lofty Botanic Garden is full of trails worth exploring (especially in autumn when the trees begin to change colour).

Waterfall Gully in Mount Lofty — Waterfall Gully delivers a healthy dose of nature. (Image: Ben Goodes)

The steep 3.9-kilometre (one-way) trail to the aptly named Waterfall Gully is the state’s most popular walk for a reason, but for an equally beautiful (and less crowded) walk with city views, try the 5.8-kilometre Sugarloaf Circuit from Chambers Gully, where there’s a good chance koalas and kangaroos will outnumber walkers.

Slow down and find your rhythm on a Murray River journey through time and place.

Trust is a funny thing. It seems not that long ago that my mother was insisting on pouring the milk into my cereal bowl, because she didn’t trust me not to slosh it over the table, and yet here I am on the Murray River at Mildura in far north-west Victoria, being handed the keys to a very new and very expensive luxury houseboat.

After a crash course in how not to crash, I’m at the wheel of the good ship Elevate – pride of the All Seasons fleet – guiding her upstream past red-ochre cliffs as pelicans glide above the rippled river and kookaburras call from reedy banks. There’s a brief moment of breath-holding while I negotiate a hairpin turn around a jagged reef of skeletal, submerged gum trees, before a cheer rings out and calm descends as the timeless river unfurls in front of us.

The Murray River winding through Yarrawonga. (Image: Rob Blackburn)

Setting sail from Mildura

Murray River birds — Home to a large number of bird species, including pelicans. (Image: The Precint Studios)

A journey along the Murray River is never less than magical, and launching from Mildura makes perfect sense. Up here the river is wide and largely empty, giving novice skippers like myself the confidence to nudge the 60-tonne houseboat up to the riverbank where we tie up for the night, without fear of shattering the glass elevator (the boat is fully wheelchair accessible) or spilling our Champagne.

My friends and I spend three days on the water, swimming and fishing, sitting around campfires onshore at night, and basking in air so warm you’d swear you were in the tropics. The simplicity of river life reveals an interesting dichotomy: we feel disconnected from the world but at the same time connected to Country, privileged to be part of something so ancient and special.

Stop one: Echuca

19th-century paddlesteamers — A historic 19th-century paddlesteamer cruises along the Murray River. (Image: Visit Victoria)

The six-hour drive from Melbourne to Mildura (or four hours and 20 minutes from Adelaide) is more than worth it, but you don’t have to travel that far to find fun on the river. Once Australia’s largest inland port, Echuca is the closest point on the Murray to Melbourne (two hours 45 minutes), and you’ll still find a plethora of paddlesteamers tethered to the historic timber wharf, a throwback to the thriving river trade days of the 19th century. The PS Adelaide, built in 1866 and the oldest wooden-hulled paddlesteamer operating in the world, departs daily for one-hour cruises, while a brand-new paddlesteamer, the PS Australian Star , is launching luxury seven-night voyages in December through APT Touring.

The town is also a hot food and wine destination. St Anne’s Winery at the historic Port of Echuca precinct has an incredibly photogenic cellar door, set inside an old carriage builders’ workshop on the wharf and filled with huge, 3000-litre port barrels. The Mill, meanwhile, is a cosy winter spot to sample regional produce as an open fire warms the red-brick walls of this former flour mill.

Stop two: Barmah National Park

Just half-an-hour upstream, Barmah National Park is flourishing, its river red gum landscape (the largest in the world) rebounding magnificently after the recent removal of more than 700 feral horses. The internationally significant Ramsar-listed wetland sits in the heart of Yorta Yorta Country, with Traditional Owners managing the environment in close partnership with Parks Victoria. Walkways weave through the forest, crossing creeks lined with rare or threatened plants, passing remnants of Yorta Yorta oven mounds and numerous scar trees, where the bark was removed to build canoes, containers or shields.

The Dharnya Centre (open weekdays until 3pm) is the cultural hub for the Yorta Yorta. Visitors can learn about the ecological significance of the Barmah Lakes on a 90-minute river cruise, led by a First Nations guide, or take a one-hour, guided cultural walking tour along the Yamyabuc Trail.

Stop three: Cobram

Continue east to Cobram to find the southern hemisphere’s largest inland beach. Swarming with sun-seekers in summer, the white sand of Thompson’s Beach is shaded by majestic river red gums and dotted with hundreds of beach umbrellas, as beachgoers launch all manner of water craft and set up stumps for beach cricket. But the beach is at its most captivating at sunset, when the crowds thin out, the glassy river mirrors the purple sky, and the canopies of the gum trees glow fiery orange.

The region is also home to some fine resorts and indulgent retreats. Yarrawonga Mulwala Golf Club Resort has two riverside championship golf courses, luxury apartments and self-contained villas. While not strictly on the Murray, the historic wine town of Rutherglen is rife with boutique (and unique) accommodation, including an exquisitely renovated red-brick tower in a French provincial-style castle at Mount Ophir Estate. Fans of fortified wines can unravel the mystery of Rutherglen’s ‘Muscat Mile’, meeting the vignerons and master-blenders whose artistry has put the town on the global map for this rich and complex wine style.

Stop four: Albury-Wodonga

First Nations YindyamarraSculpture Walk — First Nations Yindyamarra Sculpture Walk is part of the Wagirra Trail. (Image: Carmen Zammit)

Follow the river far enough upstream and you’ll arrive at the twin border cities of Albury-Wodonga. The Hume Highway thunders through, but serenity can be found along the five-kilometre Yindyamarra Sculpture Walk – part of the Wagirra Trail that meanders through river wetlands just west of Albury in Wiradjuri country. Fifteen sculptures by local First Nations artists line the trail, conveying stories of reconciliation, enduring connection to culture, local Milawa lore and traditional practices. It feels a long way from Mildura, and it is, but the pelicans and kookaburras remind us that it’s the same river, the great conduit that connects our country.

A traveller’s checklist

Staying there

New Mildura motel Kar-rama. (Image: Iain Bond Photo)

Kar-Rama is a brand-new boutique, retro-styled motel in Mildura, with a butterfly-shaped pool and a tropical, Palm Springs vibe. Echuca Holiday Homes has a range of high-end accommodation options, both on the riverfront and in town.

Playing there

BruceMunro’s Trail of Lights in Mildura — Bruce Munro’s Trail of Lights in Mildura. (Image: Imogen Eveson)

Artist Bruce Munro’s Trail of Lights installation, comprising more than 12,000 illuminated ‘fireflies’, is currently lighting up Mildura’s Lock Island in the middle of the Murray. Murray Art Museum Albury (MAMA) is a hub for contemporary art, with a rotating roster of exhibitions, and is a major outlet for young and First Nations artists.

Eating there

Mildura’s diverse demographic means it’s a fantastic place to eat. Andy’s Kitchen is a local favourite, serving up delicious pan-Asian dishes and creative cocktails in a Balinese-style garden setting. Call in to Spoons Riverside in Swan Hill to enjoy locally sourced, seasonal produce in a tranquil setting overlooking the river.

7 free things to do in Adelaide