MOUNT BARKER Mount Barker is now an outer of Adelaide, but not that long back Mount Barker was a long and arduous drive from Adelaide. Now it is 20 minutes. This change in ‘positioning’ does not lessen the fact the town is historical, with heritage factors at work. Mount Barker is a quite pretty town. The Mount Barker Summit was first discovered by Captain Collet Barker  in 1830, but he was killed by Aborigines in 1831, so Captain Charles Sturt named Mount Barker after him when he founded it in 1834. Mount Barker lies at the base of a local mountain of the same name, called the Mount Barker Summit by locals. It is 50 kilometres from the Murray River. Mount Barker was traditionally a farming area, and many of the lots just outside the town area are farming lots, although some of them have been replaced with new subdivisions in recent times. Mount Barker was the epicenter for an Earthquake on 16 April 2010 at 11.35pm local time, the quake registered 3.8 on the Richter scale. The Methodist and Catholic Churches are the design standouts in Mt Barker. The Anglican and Presbyterian a little more modest. The Mount Barker War Memorial is located within the civic gardens. Mount Barker still has a number of hotels, both modern and unpretentious. All old and well over 100 years in business. With Adelaide being so close a stopover would now not usually be a consideration. But if the timing is right rest up at Mount Barker.