An Adelaide Hills Day Trip: The Big Rocking Horse and Melba's Chocolate Factory

The Adelaide Hills are close enough that most people from Adelaide treat them as somewhere to drive through rather than somewhere to go. Two stops make a good argument against that, and they are near enough to each other to do in one unhurried day.

Both are the kind of place that has been there long enough to become a local institution — which is exactly why they are worth the trip.

The Big Rocking Horse, Gumeracha 🐴

Australia has a long tradition of building an enormous version of something and putting it beside a road. The Big Rocking Horse at Gumeracha is one of the best of them: 18 metres tall, and the largest rocking horse in the world.

The thing that makes it better than the rest of the Big Things is that you can climb it. There are three levels, and the view from the top is out over the Hills.

It stands at the Toy Factory, which is a genuine working workshop rather than a gift shop with a theme. They make handcrafted wooden toys on site, and you can watch some of it happening. There is also a wildlife park attached where you can feed kangaroos, plus a café — which between them turn a ten-minute photo stop into most of a morning.

Melba’s Chocolate Factory, Woodside 🍫

A short drive south, Melba’s Chocolate Factory sits at 22 Henry Street in Woodside. It is a working factory you can walk through, and the appeal is that it has never modernised: the chocolate is still made with traditional methods on vintage equipment, and you watch it happening from a viewing area rather than through a video.

Two rooms are the highlights. The Depositing Room is where the chocolate goes into moulds and comes out as shapes. The Toffee Room is where the older stuff gets made — including the peanut brittle, which is the thing most people leave carrying.

It is free to walk through, there is no tour to book, and it takes as long as you want it to take. With kids, that flexibility is worth more than a polished experience would be.

Making a day of it

Do the rocking horse first. It is the more active of the two, and it is better done before lunch than after a bag of peanut brittle.

They are close together. Gumeracha to Woodside is a short drive through the Hills — the sort of road that is half the reason to come up here in the first place.

Check opening days before you leave. Both places keep their own hours and neither is open around the clock. A quick look before you drive up saves the trip.

Leave room in the boot. Between wooden toys and chocolate, nobody in our car left empty-handed.

Neither of these is a hidden gem — every South Australian has been to both, most of them as a child. That is sort of the point. If you are visiting Adelaide and want a day that is not a winery, this is the one.