Road Test MG4 Essence 64

The wide and slow Kanamaluka/Tamar is a river with few meanders, but to drive a lap around it makes for a meandering day filled with pleasures. And on a cold, still morning in Rosevears, with the water like glass, it feels entirely appropriate that I’m driving it in the near silence of an electric vehicle.

My car is a jet-black MG4 Essence 64, a car introduced into Australia in 2023 and one of the country’s cheapest entry-level EVs, though as I swing off the West Tamar Highway onto the slaloming curves of this minor riverside road through Rosevears, it feels anything but cut-rate.

The experience of driving the MG4 is different from the very moment I open the door, an action that effectively switches on the car. Download the MG iSMART app and you can start things even earlier, remotely turning on features such as the air-conditioning or, on a cold winter day, the driver’s seat heating.

Once inside, I need only turn a dial that hovers above the deep centre console to ‘Drive’ and I am away, weaving out of Launceston and crossing the West Tamar Bridge almost at the point where the South Esk and North Esk rivers merge to become Kanamaluka/Tamar.

The hills around are draped in mist, but in just a few minutes there’s a chance to get acquainted with my faithful companion for the day – the river – at the Tamar Island Wetlands, where a 1.5km boardwalk, one of Tasmania’s 60 Great Short Walks, loops out to an island in the middle of the waterway. If time is pressing, there’s a shorter stroll to the circular Wetlands visitor centre, overlooking a reed-surrounded lagoon where, this morning, a trio of black swans adds elegance to the scene as rain dapples the surface of the water.

On Kanamaluka/Tamar’s west bank, the scenic way isn’t the direct way. I’ve chosen the most riverside of routes: this road through Rosevears and a second diversion through Gravelly Beach.

They’re fun roads on which to settle into the MG4’s driving ways. Though the skies are heavy, the car is light on the road, punting quickly to 60km/h and beyond around each bend. As a rear-wheel drive with 50:50 weight distribution, the car is agile, wriggling comfortably through curves and corners.

The Essence 64 is the second-from-top model in the MG4’s four tiers, adding, among other features, a rear spoiler to give it a sporty, though not showy, appearance. This isn’t a car you’d instantly identify as an EV – it’s more Corolla than Polestar in look. And with 435km to a battery charge, there’s no range anxiety on a drive like this one around Kanamaluka/ Tamar, especially with charging stations dotted around the river.

By the time I reach Exeter, it’s time for coffee. I pull in at The Cabin, a cafe with rustic, farmhouse styling, and a vehicle charging station directly across the road. We refuel together – caffeine for me, electricity for the MG4. It’s like a brunch date with a car.

River turns to earth as the drive stretches on to Beaconsfield, a town founded on mining with a tall mine header still rising above the old gold mine and the Beaconsfield Mine and Heritage Centre. Inside the museum, displays include a fascinating exhibition on the 2006 mine collapse that briefly turned Beaconsfield into an international headline. Along the river’s west bank, this drive ultimately leads to beauty – literally, in the form of Beauty Point, where I turn onto the wharf. Here, platypuses and seahorses swim about in side-by-side sheds, hanging out together over the river at Platypus House and Seahorse World. Looking north from the wharf’s end, Kanamaluka/Tamar squeezes through one of its narrowest points, beginning its final approach to Bass Strait.

Doubling back towards Exeter, the drive banks, crossing the river from west to east beneath the wiry supports of Batman Bridge. When built in the 1960s, this was Australia’s first cable-stayed bridge, and its 200m span is an indication of the river’s impressive width.

On the east bank, where the hills seem to crowd the river even tighter, I continue the drive downstream, passing through George Town and almost into Bass Strait at Low Head. The so-called Heavy Metal Penguins, a pair of brutalist penguin sculptures, remind me that this is penguin country. Take the evening penguin-viewing tour and the birds can almost step on your toes, but in the daylight I continue the final few hundred metres to Low Head Lighthouse.

Parking the MG4 outside the gate, I wander up to this Bass Strait night light, which pegs Tasmania into place at the point where Kanamaluka/Tamar meets the sea. The river is ending, but my day’s drive is effectively only half over as I turn back towards Launceston.

Sights and stops are fewer and further between on this side of the river, but that creates a chance to open up the throttle and enjoy the MG4’s ride back towards Launceston.

The car has four driving modes, from Snow to Sport, that I can casually flick between with my thumb. In the quiet, natural setting around the river, the Eco mode has somehow felt right all day, but I now push it up to Sport. On the 10.25-inch infotainment display, I can tap into battery data and even local weather details (and, more clumsily, control the air-con and heating – dials here would be simpler and better), while the compact digital cluster display behind the steering wheel has information from speed to tyre pressures.

I stop for a late lunch in Hillwood Berries where, in winter, the berries live on as jams, vinegars and toppings, and then make a final detour into Windermere. Commanding the best view in this riverside town is St Matthias’ Anglican Church, one of the oldest Anglican churches in the state. Atop a small rise, it looks down onto the boat ramp and across the river to Rosevears, where I stood just a few hours before. I’m returning to Launceston, but this view back in time – to my early morning in Rosevears – feels like the suitable closing of the loop on this day around Kanamaluka/Tamar.