Guide
The best driving roads in Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia rides through jungle, rice terrace and limestone karst. Vietnam’s Hai Van and Ma Pi Leng passes trace the coast and the high north, Thailand’s Mae Hong Son Loop strings together hundreds of bends, and the Philippines' Halsema Highway climbs into the cloud. These are the finest we have mapped across Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines, each from real geometry.
Hai Van Pass15 mi · 31 min · 71 cornersView the roadbook ›
Distance
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1
15 mi31 min
Hai Van Pass
Vietnam’s most iconic coastal mountain pass, made world-famous by Top Gear, threading 21 km over a 496 m summit between Da Nang and Lăng Cô with the sea far below.
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2
15 mi34 minMa Pi Leng Pass
The 'King of Vietnamese Passes', a 22 km edge-of-the-world road across the Dong Van Karst Plateau hanging above the Nho Que River gorge, one of Southeast Asia’s deepest canyons, 800 m below.
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3
125 mi4 h 21 minMae Hong Son Loop
Thailand’s most celebrated mountain highway runs 245 km from Chiang Mai to Mae Hong Son via Pai, through remote hill-tribe country on continuous switchbacks.
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4
77 mi3 h 8 minHalsema Highway
The highest highway in the Philippines, climbing the Cordillera Central to a 2,255 m summit at Atok, a 150 km spine of ridgeline driving with near-continuous panoramas.
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5
2 mi4 minKelok 9
Six soaring concrete viaducts thread a tropical rainforest gorge in West Sumatra, turning a notorious mountain bottleneck into one of Indonesia’s most photogenic drives, pillars rising 58 m above the gorge floor.
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6
38 mi1 h 33 minCameron Highlands Road
Malaysia’s iconic colonial-era mountain climb, 90 km of continuous hairpins through dense rainforest and cloud forest from Tapah to the tea estates of the Cameron Highlands.
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7
3 mi7 minKintamani Caldera Rim
Bali’s most dramatic drive runs the rim of the Mount Batur caldera at ~1,500 m, where a single crest reveals an active volcanic cone, a crater lake and black lava fields in one panorama.
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8
29 mi58 minDoi Inthanon Summit Road
Route 1009 is the only paved road to the summit of Doi Inthanon, Thailand’s highest peak at 2,565 m, climbing 48 km through tropical, pine and rare montane cloud forest.
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9
21 mi49 minKennon Road
The original and most dramatic ascent to Baguio: a 34 km canyon climb with over 50 hairpins, waterfalls, pine forest and the Lion’s Head landmark, prone to closure from landslides.
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10
94 mi3 h 8 minLojing Highlands Highway
The Second East-West Highway pierces the Titiwangsa Range through the Lojing Highlands, a sustained drive above the cloud layer past pristine rainforest and the towering Lojing Viaduct.
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