McClaren Vale – a lovely wine region close to Adelaide and getting there on the world's longest reversible one-way freeway!

McClaren Vale

One of many quirky things about Adelaide is its Southern Expressway.  This is the world's longest reversible one-way freeway.  You drive one way on it for half the day and then it is closed briefly and re-opened for the other part of the day for driving in the opposite direction.  Weird huh? 

It won't be like that for too much longer because the State Government has decided that it would duplicate it – and make it into a normal motorway.  Of course, it would have been a lot cheaper if it had been built as two way in the first place.

We did a day trip to have a look at the wine region McClaren Vale and to get there we got to go on the one way freeway – it was a weekend and on the weekends the freeway goes the opposite way round from during the week.

McClaren Vale is a nice wine region with lots of wineries that you can visit to do wine tastings – which are free and generously poured!  A bit of a missed opportunity for my better half who volunteered to be the designated driver!  But I tasted (and bought) some very nice Rieslings.  We had lunch at one winery (Woodstock) which rather than being relaxed and informal turned out to be very "posh".  Unfortunately the pasta special of the day I had turned out to be the only real disappointment in terms of South Australian food that we had the whole time we were there.  But we did stumble onto a lovely 2008 chardonnay there so that made up for it somewhat.

Aldinga Beach

Another highlight of the day was the drive back to Adelaide – we went up the coast and were driving merrily along and came round a corner and there was an amazing sight.  Aldinga Beach. As you can see from the photo, when you go to this beach you take your car, drive along the beach, park up with your friends and have a picnic right alongside your vehicle by the water.

This is not something that is permitted on any other beach in the area – quite something.  We even saw synchronised vehicles being moved inland to avoid the rising tide.

Maslin Beach

Then a little bit further along the coast we came to Maslin Beach – and it had signs saying that it was an "Unclad Beach" – by which we believe it meant for nudists.  But the indication was that you could only go naked at least 500m down the beach and the section that could be seen from the carpark did not contain any naked people – and no, we didn't go walking down to see if we could see any!

It was a lovely day.  Don't miss going there, if you get some time in Adelaide.

And just to finish off, I was struck by this sign we passed on the side of the road – aimed at snakes perhaps? ( I looked it up via Mr Google just now and apparently it is intended to warn people who allow their speed to creep up!)