There are sensible ways to travel from Sydney to Ardour Milton Park in Bowral. You could take a small hatchback. You could catch a train. You could probably arrive on an electric bicycle wearing expensive trousers.
We hired a Land Rover Defender.
This was unnecessary. The road to the Southern Highlands is sealed, signposted and almost entirely free of charging rhinoceroses. But we are city people, and city people embarking on a country adventure require a vehicle capable of invading a minor principality.
Within minutes, the Defender had performed its first miracle: making the Southern Highlands feel more adventurous than the M5 ordinarily allows.
Bowral is only 90 minutes from Sydney, but psychologically it is somewhere near the Victorian border. The temperature drops, the trees become more serious and suddenly everyone is discussing fireplaces, pinot noir and whether hydrangeas have had a good year.
On the way, we stopped in Robertson, which featured in the film Babe. There were no talking pigs, but there was a wagyu beef pie. This was better. It possessed that rare quality found in great country bakeries: the ability to make you consider moving house.
Soon afterwards, we encountered a roadside honey farm operating with an honesty box. This would last approximately nine seconds in Sydney, where someone would steal the honey, the box and possibly the farm. Here, we deposited our money, collected a jar and continued towards Ardour Milton Park Bowral feeling unreasonably wholesome.
Then the hotel appeared.
Milton Park is less a hotel than an English country estate that took a wrong turn at Dover and ended up in the Southern Highlands. It sits among 25 acres of lawns and gardens, complete with great weeping beech trees, horses and the sort of drive that makes you wonder whether you should have brought a dinner jacket or inherited a title.
The house was built in 1910 for the Hordern family, once one of Sydney’s great retail dynasties. Their name survives in the Hordern Pavilion, although Milton Park is considerably less likely to host a heavy-metal concert.
Originally a private residence on a cattle and horse estate, it became a hotel in the 1980s. Salter Brothers acquired it decades later and gave it the sort of multimillion-dollar rejuvenation that involved closing the doors, pulling things apart and working out what was worth saving.
Quite a lot, as it happens.
General manager David McDonald showed us original floorboards that had spent years concealed beneath carpet. Once uncovered, they were sanded and polished rather than replaced. Historic fireplaces, mirrors, artwork and furniture were also retained, with old sofas sent away to be reupholstered.
The result is clever. Too much restoration and a hotel becomes a museum where you are frightened to put down your coffee. Too much modernisation and it becomes an airport lounge with cushions. Ardour Milton Park sits happily in the middle.
Its 44 rooms use palettes of sage green, royal navy and blush pink, accompanied by timber, marble and brass. The old building has not been stripped of its character; it has simply been persuaded to take a bath and put on a very good suit.
Having done almost nothing except drive, eat a pie and purchase honey, we naturally required recovery. So we walked through the grounds to the spa, submitted ourselves to a treatment, had a sauna and swam in the pool.
This is what country life does to you. Farmers rise before dawn, repair fences and wrestle livestock. Visitors from Sydney lie face-down in a robe because navigating out of the city has been emotionally draining.
Dinner at Horderns Restaurant is where the estate begins to make complete sense. Executive chef Mark Holland grew up in England and describes the property as having the atmosphere of a grand English manor. His cooking draws on family travels through Europe while making full use of Australian produce.
We began with bluefin tuna carpaccio, delicate enough to require actual attention rather than the usual metropolitan habit of photographing it until it goes warm. Next came Riverina Black Angus sirloin, cooked with the confidence of a kitchen that knows beef does not need a motivational speech. Holland shows me a video of a cow and her calf walking in the road on his way to work. One of his chefs leans over. “Veal tonight” she suggest?
A steamed snapper on spinach was equally impressive: restrained, elegant and absolutely delicious.
Holland has also reinvented the Sunday roast. His first version arrived as an enormous individual plate, but he decided this did not suit the restaurant. So it became a family-style banquet with beef, roast vegetables, Yorkshire puddings, horseradish and a large jug of gravy.
This is important because insufficient gravy is one of civilisation’s more baffling failures. Holland says he loves it. He is therefore a man whose judgement can be trusted.
Elsewhere, The Polo Bar offers drinks, fireside comfort and doors opening to the courtyard. There is also a private cheese and charcuterie room where a chef can guide guests through matched wines and condiments. The estate hosts weddings, conferences and events for up to 200 people, despite having just 44 rooms.
But numbers are not the point.
The appeal of Ardour Milton Park lies in its ability to create distance. Sydney may be only 90 minutes away, yet after a walk beneath the old trees, a swim, an excellent dinner and a night inside the restored estate, it seems to belong to another life.
The next morning, we climb back into the Defender with our jar of honey and point its enormous bonnet towards the city.
We had conquered no mountains and crossed no deserts. The most challenging terrain had been a hotel driveway. But for one night, we had escaped the traffic, eaten extremely well and breathed lungfuls of country air.
And sometimes that is adventure enough.
Need to know
The hotel has a special offer of 10% off if you book two nights.
- Buffet breakfast in Horderns Restaurant
- Complimentary Wi-Fi
- Complimentary self-parking
Room rates vary between $500-$600 a night including breakfast
200 Horderns RoadBowral, NSW, 2576Australia
Phone: Tel: +61 2 4861 8100
E-mail: [email protected]
