Canberra Nature Park: Melrose Nature Reserve and Enchanted Hill

General Information

Grading: medium

Distance:   11.7 kilometers

Total climb:   533 meters

Time taken:   3 hours 40 minutes

Map:   Tuggeranong 8727-3S 1:25 000

Start point distance by road from Canberra GPO:   22 kilometres

Start point map grid reference:  street address

Destination map grid reference:  55H FA 94882 73565 (Enchanted Hill)

End point:  same as start

Route

Description

The starting point for this walk was the parking area just off the Monaro Highway on Old Tuggeranong Road (near the paintball area). We started by climbing up the road through pine forests until we found a sign saying Melrose Nature Reserve on the right. We entered the Reserve and headed roughly south, with some good views towards Melrose Valley.

About 2.8 kilometres into the walk we headed east towards the site of the old railway workers camp and then on to the disused Goulburn-Bombala Railway line itself.

We followed the tracks for s short distance to the point where it crossed Rocky Gully, where we turned off to the left and followed the Gully up to a point where we could climb Enchanted Hill. This last climb was rather steep, but the views from Enchanted Hill were very good in all directions.

To return we followed an old trach down the Hill and eventually came to the Monaro Highway which we followed back to the starting point.