The haunting of Kingston Foreshore: Chilling ghost tour explores our earliest suburbs

A lot of “hard to explain” things happen to Sarah Stewart.

Like how she spent months researching the death of a little boy named Leo, who lived at The Causeway in the 1920s and died suddenly in a tragic accident. And then, on a visit to Queanbeyan’s Riverside Cemetery for further research, she literally tripped over Leo’s headstone.

“I sort of stumbled on the edge of a grave and I looked down and it was the memorial stone for this wee lad,” she recalls.

“And it wasn't just his name on it, but he had a younger sister, a baby. And it was almost like I was being directed to look; this poor mother not only lost a nine-year-old son, but she lost a wee baby daughter just six months before.

“I'm feeling shivers go down my spine even now just telling you the story. “

Sarah has always been fascinated by storytelling – and ghost stories in particular – and grew up listening to tales of hauntings in her hometown of Salisbury, England.

She’s now a Canberra resident, via New Zealand, and the visionary behind the Foreshore Ghosts, Tales and True Crime tour. The tour was a “research project” in 2020 when Sarah and her adult children were all back in Canberra and dreaming about what they would do when they could go outside again and explore. The family had always been united by a love of the unexplained, so Sarah began researching a ghost tour they could do around their home on Kingston Foreshore.

She struck gold when she started sorting through the rich history of The Causeway, one of Canberra’s first suburbs and the home of thousands of male workers, who built Canberra from the ground up.

“When you look into it, there are some really terrible, tragic stories from The Causeway,” Sarah says,

“The men lived in rows of tents and were quite poor.

“The first camp was around the back of Kingston railway station. So at different times I’ve taken mediums around there and we’ve learnt some very interesting things.”

Lake Burley Griffin, too, is a highlight of Sarah’s tour, which she decided to open to the public after rave reviews from her family.

“I talk about the history and some of the true crime associated with the lake,” Sarah says.

“It's not very old, as you know; only 60 years. But there's been some terribly tragic accidents and crime in and around its shores.”

When Sarah started giving public tours in 2021, new stories came to light. One in particular about the Old Causeway Village Hall. And then there’s the inexplicable stench around Newcastle House, a former weighing station that gives Sarah bad vibes.

Sarah is hosting Foreshore Ghosts, Tales and True Crime for Halloween tomorrow night (you can book here) and tours are especially popular with Canberrans and their visiting friends and families over the summer months.

“People think Canberra doesn’t have a history, but it does,” Sarah says.

“I love being able to bring some of that history to life.”

For future tour dates and more information on Foreshore Ghosts, Tales and True Crime, head to the Facebook page.

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