Belgrave Lake Park Playground, Park Drive, Belgrave
A playground which fits well into the natural environment. The central area has an adventure obstacle course with long rope traverse, thick rope traverse, steps on vertical poles and a little horizontal rope bridge. On the side is a water channel with a hand pump for warmer days.
One side has a wall with tunnel slide, dual wave sides, various ladders, fireman's pole, tunnel and shopfront. The Smooth Glider has seats which you can sit on and enjoy a smooth rocking motion back-and-forth. On the way, play the percussion pipes beside the ramp leading up to the glider. Also a gear panel for the budding engineers, two birds nest swings, two standard swings, lovely platypus carved in a rock, standalone monkey bars, spinning disk and big snaking rope swing.
In the middle is a shelter with four tables. There are more shelters, tables, BBQs and water taps scattered about. About 50m away are toilets. There is also a dog off-leash area which is quite well fenced off from the playground area. There is an outdoor gym and basketball half court with markings for hopscotch and foursquare.
The park features the Log Cabin Museum. The original kiosk, curiously named the 'Log Cabin Museum', was built when the Park Reserve was established in 1939.
The stone and log cabin, which has served both the Auto Camp and the Reserve, is a masonry structure, faced with random flagstone (sandstone), and hardwood bush poles used as part of the roof structure. The poles are exposed at each of the gable ends with smaller bush poles serving as rafters at the eaves. The poles also include half rounds used on the gable ends and as window covers. The building once had a shingled roof that has been recently covered with corrugated iron, probably at the time when an extension was added to the rear of the kiosk in the late 1950s. The structure is typical of the park architecture, or 'parkitecture' developed by the U.S. National Parks Service and adopted here by the Public Works Department and others. Examples of park buildings that use a similar design are relatively rare, but other examples can be found at Yarra Bend Golf Course, at Buchan and in other places around Australia.
Photos:
Location
46 Park Drive, Belgrave 3160 Map
