As summer heats up and holidaygoers amass at the great water bodies along the Murray River, two brothers have slogged away to be ready for the tourist season with an attraction straight out of the history books.
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Fraser and Robbie Knowles grew up on the water so instead of sinking their money into fixing up a car in their driveway the pair invested more than $250,000 into refurbishing a Border icon.
The Yarrawonga pair brought the historic Cumberoona down the river in March from Albury to Lake Mulwala and took its two big wheels for a few practice spins for tourists in November.
Skipper Robbie is the man who steers while Fraser takes up the position of engineer in the guts of the steamer.
Fraser said they had run six trips a weekend during the trial period.
“The first month was great, we had a lot of great feedback,” he said.
“A lot of people travelled from Albury to come and have a look at her to see what we've done.
“We’ve put a lot of time and effort into it … we’re very happy with the restoration of the boat.”
The steamer has remained moored up this month, except for a quick family trip on the water at Christmas.
The Knowles brothers laboured to outfit the 130-tonne monster with a commercial kitchen in preparation for the busy tourist season which has hit Yarrawonga-Mulwala.
Fraser was reluctant to say how much more they had spent on the kitchen but said it had been “a few bob”.
One final flourish he hopes to add to the Cumberoona is the word “Albury” painted in old time letters on the back to signify its origin.
Fraser said unless water levels changed significantly it would be a while before they could bring the boat back up to Albury but it was still in their plans.
The steamer will launch again on Saturday on Lake Mulwala and run three times every day in January to meet the rush of summertime tourists.
“There are 30,000 people here at the moment,” he said.
“It's a bit different to our usual 8000.”
Restoring the boat has been a challenging venture for the Knowles brothers.
The duo went into business together little more than a year ago with their charter business Cruise Yarrawonga Mulwala.
