Roads in Oceania
8 roads found in Oceania
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Crown Range Road
🇳🇿 New Zealand
The Crown Range Road is New Zealand's highest sealed (paved) road, climbing to 1,076 meters as it connects Queenstown to Wanaka across the Crown Range in the South Island's Central Otago region. The 67-kilometer route is the most direct road between these two popular resort towns and offers a far more dramatic alternative to the longer highway route via Cromwell. The road climbs steeply from the Kawarau Gorge through a series of tight switchbacks with spectacular views back over the Wakatipu Basin and the Remarkables mountain range. At the summit, a short walk leads to a lookout with 360-degree views encompassing Lake Wakatipu, Lake Wanaka, and the surrounding peaks. The descent into the Cardrona Valley passes the iconic Cardrona Hotel (built in 1863) and the Cardrona ski field. In winter, the summit can be snowbound and chains may be required, adding an extra dimension of adventure to the crossing.
Forgotten World Highway
🇳🇿 New Zealand
The Forgotten World Highway (State Highway 43) is a 150-kilometer road connecting Stratford in Taranaki to Taumarunui in the King Country region of New Zealand's North Island. The road winds through some of the most remote and sparsely populated countryside in the country, passing through a landscape that seems frozen in time with abandoned settlements, historic tunnels, and dense native bush. The highway traverses the Tangarakau Gorge, a deep forested valley so remote that it was one of the last areas of the North Island to be mapped. The road passes through the Moki Tunnel, a hand-hewn passage through solid rock, and over saddle points with views of Mount Taranaki's perfect volcanic cone. The tiny settlement of Whangamomona, population roughly 30, famously declared itself an independent republic in 1989 and continues to issue its own passports. The highway is the only road in New Zealand that passes through a genuine ghost town: the abandoned coal mining village of Tangarakau.
Gibb River Road
🇦🇺 Australia
The Gibb River Road is a legendary 660-kilometer outback track traversing the heart of the Kimberley region in Western Australia, connecting Derby to Kununurra. Originally built as a cattle route in the 1960s, this rugged unsealed road is one of Australia's great 4WD adventures, crossing vast cattle stations, ancient gorge systems, and Aboriginal lands in one of the most remote inhabited regions on Earth. The road passes through a landscape of epic scale: ancient sandstone ranges over two billion years old, wide river crossings that can be impassable after rains, and hidden gorges with crystal-clear swimming holes. Highlights include Windjana Gorge with its colony of freshwater crocodiles basking on the banks, the tiered waterfalls of Mitchell Falls (accessible via a rough side track), and the stunning natural amphitheatre of El Questro Wilderness Park. The night skies along the Gibb are among the darkest and most star-filled in the world.
Great Ocean Road
🇦🇺 Australia
The Great Ocean Road is a 243-kilometer coastal drive in Victoria, Australia, stretching from Torquay to Allansford along the southeastern coast. Built by returned soldiers between 1919 and 1932 as a memorial to those who died in World War I, it is the world's largest war memorial and one of Australia's most popular tourist destinations. The road hugs the rugged coastline of the Southern Ocean, passing through rainforest, alongside towering cliffs, and past iconic rock formations. The most famous landmarks along the route are the Twelve Apostles, a collection of limestone sea stacks rising dramatically from the Southern Ocean. Originally formed from the eroding cliffs over millions of years, only eight stacks remain standing (one collapsed in 2005). Nearby, Loch Ard Gorge, named after a shipwreck in 1878, offers sheltered beaches framed by towering cliff walls, and London Arch (formerly London Bridge) demonstrates the ongoing erosion that shapes this coastline, having lost its connection to the mainland in 1990. Beyond the coastline, the Great Ocean Road passes through the Otway Ranges, a region of ancient temperate rainforest with towering mountain ash trees, fern gullies, and cascading waterfalls. The charming towns of Lorne, Apollo Bay, and Port Campbell offer accommodation, dining, and surfing. The road is open year-round, and while it can be driven in a single day, most visitors recommend at least two days to properly explore the many lookouts, walking trails, and coastal towns along the way.
Lasseter Highway
🇦🇺 Australia
Lasseter Highway is a 245-kilometer sealed road running from the Stuart Highway at Erldunda to Yulara, the resort town serving Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park in Australia's Red Centre. Named after Harold Lasseter, a controversial explorer who claimed to have found a vast gold reef in the Central Australian desert in the 1930s, the highway crosses a stark but beautiful landscape of red sand plains, desert oak woodlands, and distant flat-topped mesa formations. The drive is a gradual immersion into the deep outback. The landscape becomes increasingly red and arid as you head west, with the iconic profiles of Mount Conner (often mistaken for Uluru), Uluru, and Kata Tjuta gradually emerging from the desert haze. The final approach to Uluru is unforgettable: the monolith rises abruptly from the flat desert plain, changing color throughout the day from ochre to deep crimson. Kata Tjuta's 36 domed rock formations, visible from the highway, are equally spectacular and geologically far more complex than Uluru.
Milford Road
🇳🇿 New Zealand
The Milford Road (State Highway 94) is a 119-kilometer mountain road in New Zealand's South Island, connecting Te Anau with Milford Sound in Fiordland National Park. The route passes through some of the most pristine wilderness in New Zealand, traversing ancient beech forests, alongside mirror-still lakes, through the dramatic Homer Tunnel, and into the sheer-walled Cleddau Valley. Milford Sound itself, described by Rudyard Kipling as the "eighth wonder of the world," awaits at the road's end. The Homer Tunnel is the road's most remarkable feature - a 1.2-kilometer-long, single-lane tunnel carved through solid granite over twenty years (1935-1954) using manual labor and minimal machinery. The tunnel descends at a 1-in-10 gradient from the eastern portal to the western side, where it emerges into the dramatic Cleddau Valley. Traffic through the tunnel is controlled by traffic lights, with vehicles traveling in alternating directions. The descent from the tunnel through the Cleddau Valley, with sheer rock walls and cascading waterfalls on both sides, is one of the most awe-inspiring stretches of road in the Southern Hemisphere. The road passes several notable stops, including Mirror Lakes, where perfectly still tarns reflect the surrounding mountains; the Avenue of the Disappearing Mountain, an optical illusion where the mountain ahead appears to shrink as you approach; and the Chasm, where the Cleddau River has carved spectacular rock formations. Avalanche risk closes the road periodically in winter, and heavy rainfall can cause temporary closures at any time of year. Fiordland receives an average of 6,813 millimeters of rain annually, creating hundreds of temporary waterfalls that cascade down the cliff faces after storms.
Skippers Canyon Road
🇳🇿 New Zealand
Skippers Canyon Road is a notoriously dangerous 22-kilometer gravel road carved into the sheer cliff faces of Skippers Canyon near Queenstown, New Zealand. The road was hand-built by gold miners in the 1860s and has remained largely unchanged since, with no guardrails, a surface of loose gravel, and sections barely wide enough for a single vehicle. Rental car insurance is voided on this road, making it one of the few roads in the world where mainstream rental companies explicitly refuse coverage. The road descends from Coronet Peak Road into the deep Shotover River gorge, passing through narrow rock cuttings where the cliff drops away hundreds of meters to the river below. In several sections, the road is carved into a narrow shelf on the cliff face, with barely enough room for a single vehicle and nowhere to pull over if another vehicle approaches from the opposite direction. The original stone retaining walls built by Chinese gold miners in the 1860s are still visible, and the road surface varies from compacted gravel to loose stones and mud. Skippers Canyon was one of the richest gold-mining areas in New Zealand during the 1860s gold rush, and the remains of mining operations, stone cottages, and the historic Skippers suspension bridge (1901) can still be seen along the route. The canyon itself is spectacular, with steep schist rock walls plunging to the turquoise Shotover River. Today, the area is popular for jet boating, bungy jumping, and white-water rafting. Guided 4WD tours are the recommended way to experience the road, as local operators know the conditions and can navigate the tight sections safely.
Stuart Highway
🇦🇺 Australia
The Stuart Highway runs 2,834 kilometers from Adelaide on Australia's southern coast to Darwin in the tropical north, bisecting the continent through its vast red center. Named after the explorer John McDouall Stuart, who completed the first south-to-north crossing of Australia in 1862, the highway is one of the great transcontinental road journeys in the world. The drive traverses some of Australia's most iconic landscapes: the vineyards of the Barossa Valley, the underground opal mining town of Coober Pedy where residents live in dugouts to escape the heat, the otherworldly monolith of Uluru (accessible via a side road), the frontier town of Alice Springs, and the ancient sandstone domes of the Devils Marbles. The northern section passes through vast tropical savanna before arriving in Darwin's humid tropics. Between towns, the highway is ruler-straight for hundreds of kilometers across empty red desert, testing drivers with monotony and fatigue.