Best Parks in Adelaide: Parklands Ring, Cleland and the Hills Reserve Network

Adelaide is one of Australia's best-planned cities for public open space, surrounded by the Adelaide Parklands, a 760-hectare ring of parks and gardens that encircles the CBD grid and was incorporated into Colonel Light's original 1836 city plan as a permanent green belt. The parklands are used daily by residents for walking, cycling, sport and recreation and include major facilities including Bonython Park, Elder Park (home of the Riverbank amphitheatre and the Festival of Arts Botanic Park events) and the extensive sports ground reserves on the western and southern perimeter. The Adelaide Botanic Garden on North Terrace, adjacent to the CBD, is a 16-hectare heritage garden with a museum of economic botany, a bicentennial conservatory and rose garden that is open daily without charge. Cleland Conservation Park in the Adelaide Hills is 30 minutes east of the CBD and includes Cleland Wildlife Park with Australian native animal encounters, walking trails through native bushland and a lookout to Mount Lofty Summit (727 m) with outstanding views across Adelaide and Gulf St Vincent. Belair National Park south of Adelaide is the third-oldest national park in Australia, with walking tracks, tennis courts and a picnic ground in native bushland. The coastline parks at Semaphore and Glenelg provide beach foreshore recreation.