Lake Burley Griffin Cruise
18 October 2025 / Story: Roger Brook; Photos: Roger Brook, Lesley Brook
Lake Burley Griffin
8 – 10 October, 2025
DAY 1.
This trip being the first run that we have led, we arrived early to get our coffee and eagerly awaited the others to arrive. I in particular was very nervous about being in charge of the radio…. Would I say too much, or not enough being my main concern. I think the jury is out on that one, more about that later.
One by one the other cars arrived, and while we gathered our thoughts and marvelled at what a beautiful day it was. Two tradie gentlemen asked me what models of Mialto they were? I nervously replied “a red one, a white one and a silver one!” They laughed and I thought to myself, phew I got away with that. I have since learnt they were 2NC’s and 1 ND, and that NC’s have a glove box and ND’s do not, but I digress.
The five of us in 3 cars met at the Big Red Bus within Schutz Landscape Garden Centre at 8:15 for an 8:45 departure. The sun was shining in its magnificence, we must all be very righteous, so we could head off with our roof’s down and the wind in our hair. We drove along the Princes Highway to Turpentine Rd where I made my first radio commentary. I informed them:
On this day the 8th October in 1871 The Great Fire of Chicago started.
In 1912: The first Balkan War began.
In 1948: The first internal Pacemaker was implanted.
In 2005: an earthquake killed at least 79,000 people in Kashmir.
in 2025: 5 intrepid travellers head to Canberra from the South Coast in their MX-5’s. Too much maybe?
From the Turpentine Rd we joined the Braidwood Rd, heading towards Nerriga. Along here I pointed out some fun facts about the route and about Nerriga. I won’t bore you all with those facts.
From Nerriga we headed towards Tarago, so I enlightened them with more fun facts this time about Tarago and also Lake Bathurst. The roads were really quiet and it was a pretty smooth trip to our first leg stretch, and my 2nd coffee of the day. I did, however; learn on the job from Geoff, while at the car park in Tarago, about the Lone Pine that is planted there. I had never noticed the plaque before. I will have to add it to my fun facts list.
I had been beginning to relax into this radio gig, but upon leaving Tarago my stress levels started to climb again as I thought of how busy the roads would be and just how many roundabouts we had to navigate through Canberra and would I lose anyone. So just time for one more fun fact transmission, this one on Lake George, an enigmatic, intermittent saline, endorheic lake. The technical term for a lake with no outlet to the sea. Water only escapes through evaporation or seepage into the ground. Other examples include the Caspian Sea and the Great Salt Lake.
As expected it was pretty busy through Queanbeyan and Canberra but fortunately we all arrived at our destination pretty much unscathed and ahead of schedule. Lunch had been arranged at Capital Brewery. So we had a yummy lunch and discussion about the journey. Following on from lunch it was only a short drive to where we were staying at the Knightsbridge Hotel in Kingston, so we all drove into the underground car park. I was relieved to leave the radio behind and went to check into our rooms.
We then reassembled at 2:15pm to walk to the Foreshore to get our next mode of transport, our Love Boat. We introduced everyone to Charles, the owner operator of the Love Boats. Roger took the wheel, he is still getting some sea time in even though he is retired from the Navy, and we headed out onto Lake Burley Griffin. The wind had picked up somewhat, and the Lake is pretty low on water as it’s been reduced in height by 1/2 metre due to the repairs being carried out on the Scrivener Dam. Everyone thought they were safe from my fun facts transmission but alas no. I pulled out a clipboard and proceeded to do some Trivia with them. The first on Canberra and the second on the mighty MX-5. Everyone told me it was a fun way to pass the time, but they were perhaps being polite.
After a couple of hours we headed back to dry land and thanked Charles for allowing us to take out one of his boats. Then I came up with a new plan, in order to keep us hydrated after the hot drive and an equally hot walk back being necessary, I thought it would be good for us to partake of a beverage to rehydrate us. So we stopped off at The Dock and then The Durham Arms. This idea was well received I believe.
We returned to the Hotel for a freshen up before heading to the Kingston Arms for dinner. At the end of the evening we said our farewells to Geoff as he was heading back to the Coast first thing in the morning.
DAY 2
The next morning we met up with Ian and Christine at 8:15 for the drive to Holt to meet up with the Canberra Chapter. I took charge of my radio again and we headed out. The weather was totally different from the day before. It was lashing down with rain and blowing a gale so we had to have the roof up. Upon arriving at Daughters at Hall in Holt for breakfast and a catch up with the Canberra Chapter there were 8 of their cars ready to show us the way.
We all headed off together, Rhys and Ashley had planned a great route via Murrumbateman, Yass, Boorowa, Young and finally to Murrumburah just outside of Harden where we all had lunch together. It was an interesting route as we had never been on those roads previously. Spring was evident everywhere you look with lots of lambs and calves in the fields and the trees starting to blossom from their winter sleep. Plus the beautiful bright yellow fields of Canola, or is it Rapeseed, I’m never too sure? We had a leg stretch at Boorowa on the way. The trip from there became easier as the rain started to ease and by the time we got to the Cafe for lunch it had all but stopped raining.
Murrumburrah has some fascinating history, we particularly loved reading about Bill The Bastard! Bill being a horse and a truly inspiring story. You really should check it out.
The two South Coasties cars decided to head back to Canberra on their own and as the weather was improving, I decided to throw in a stop at the Arboretum, as Ian and Christine had never been there before. I’m so glad we did as the sky was clearing and there was even some blue stuff up there again. We particularly enjoyed seeing the amazing Bonsai tree exhibits and the Cactus and Succulent gardens. We were both able to have the roof down for the drive back to the hotel, which was a bonus. We worked out that we had done a 350km round trip today. Our cars had gotten very dirty, so they will need a good clean.
The four of us decided an early dinner was required, so we went to Saphire, a Lebanese restaurant in Kingston before saying our good nights and farewells as we were heading off separately in the morning. The trip back was another lovely sunny albeit a very windy day, so we cruised back with the roof down.
Another couple of things I have learnt on this trip is that there are a lot of small towns where their pub/hotels are for sale which is disappointing for the locals. I noticed that the Boorowa Hotel and the Murrumburrah Hotel are for sale. Also that I’m rubbish at the photos side of things. I look at the photos I took and reflect back on the last two few days. There were many other photo opportunities I failed to capture, but hopefully you get a glimpse into our adventures in the Big City.
Zoom Zoom.
