Tucked away beside quiet residential streets is a surprisingly large reserve with a fully fenced, accessible playground, beautiful huge trees to climb and all the facilities you need.
Review by Claire Davill
Gurners Reserve in Rostrevor is definitely a hidden gem. It’s quiet, shaded, and has plenty to offer. Best of all, the playground is fully fenced and suitable for all ages, but especially good for toddlers. The equipment is showing its age, but it’s still wonderful to play on, and obvious care has been taken to ensure accessibility wherever possible.
An extra wide gate at the entrance makes it much easier to manoeuvre strollers or wheelchairs into the playground. Soft fall paths lead around to the accessible areas of the playground, and the incline ramp up to the main platform is nice and wide.
The playground includes three small slides, bubble windows, a small fireman’s pole, activity board and steering wheels and telescopes at the top of the platform. The platform can be accessed via the ramp, stairs adjacent to the slides, or ladder underneath the fireman’s pole.
Underneath the platform, there’s plenty to keep smaller kids occupied, including tunnels, crawl-through windows, abacus beads, xylophone, and bendy poles.
There’s also a second xylophone and tic tac toe board at the entrance to the ramp.
There are two swings in the play area, including one with a seat and harness/seatbelt for younger children or those with mobility needs.
There are some benches and a picnic table (with a table extension at one end for wheelchair use) within the fenced area.
Just outside of the fenced playground area are several more picnic tables, nicely shaded, with a barbeque, bins and water fountain nearby. A nearby lace bark tree drops large, fuzzy pink flowers all over the picnic area in summer – kids will love collecting and arranging these!
The real drawcard of this park are the huge Moreton Bay Fig trees, believed to have been planted by Charles William Stuart in 1838. All of them have large roots and low branches for clambering over and exploring, and they provide wonderful shade over the whole playground and picnic area.
Just past the fig trees there is a basketball hoop. On the other side of the playground area, there is a large expanse of lawn, and a toilet block. Dogs are allowed off leash during specified hours – 6am-10am and 5pm-8pm daily.
Things to consider:
- While the playground is fully fenced with child-proof gates, the picnic area, lawns and basketball hoop are not fenced. The whole park is very quiet (we were the only people present on two separate occasions), and the streets nearby are also very quiet.
- The trees provide ample shade for most of the day, but the lawn areas and basketball hoop are in full sun.
- Because of the natural shade, a lot of debris gets dropped on the accessible paths, you may need to clear this if you need to wheel a stroller or wheelchair along the paths and on the ramp.
- The barbeque will not function on days of extreme fire danger.
- There is no off-street parking for the reserve, but parking along the residential streets bordering the reserve is quite safe with very little traffic. Hamish Grove provides the closest parking to the playground, and you can also park on College Drive or Leabrook Drive.
Location:
Hamish Grove, Rostrevor
For more information and all enquiries please visit the Campbelltown City Council website
At Play & Go Adelaide we make every effort to provide accurate information to the best of our knowledge at the time of publication. We recommend confirming times, dates and details directly before making any plans as details may be subject to change.
Image Source: Play & Go Adelaide January 2024
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