Kane Stevenson calls himself a “friendly neighbourhood rail nerd”, but the 26-year-old Adelaide resident and masters student in counselling is anything but the stereotype of a trainspotter.
“Some people are like, ‘I’m going to go out, see the train, go home’,” he said.
“[I] grab some mates … we’ll get a feed, we’ll chat away, have a day, make some fun of it.
“The train kind of becomes the secondary event and it’s the time with your friends, getting out and about that becomes the main event.”
That is not to say the pursuit of the trains themselves is forgotten, with Mr Stevenson having carried his equipment up mountains, along hilltops and through creeks to get to the perfect filming and watching spots.
“I have driven eight hours, 12 hours to get to a good spot for a certain train that was running,” he said.
He shares his passion on his Facebook page, Kane’s Trains – from South Australia to the World, where he has amassed 10,000 followers.
Train power on display
Mr Stevenson said part of his attraction to trains was seeing their power as they tackled slopes.
“The Adelaide Hills are one of the steepest sections of line out there; coming through Mount Lofty is quite surreal. You can hear the trains for a good 10 or 15 minutes before they get there,” he said.
“Just the other night I was there and I was waiting and waiting and then one of us noticed, ‘Hey, it’s gone quiet’ because that train stopped, it stalled.
“It couldn’t get over the hill so they had it give it a few goes before they could actually get the power to make it through Mount Lofty.”
Mr Stevenson’s interest in trains started when he was about 10 or 12 and was given a model train set for his birthday.
At 16, he started filming and photographing trains, and he said things had taken off since he invested in a better camera.
“I’m just happy to make people’s day when they see a train that they like,” he said.
“For the most part, there’s a good community. Every community has its upsides and downsides, but there a lot of supportive and good people in the community that help each other out with info.
“You find your place within it.”
While he admitted to spending about 12 hours a week filming and uploading train videos to social media, he said he could “cheat a little” as he lives in Goodwood, in Adelaide’s inner south, and combines walking his dog, Kelly, along the line with filming footage of passing freight trains.
Fan of early diesel trains
Mr Stevenson’s favourite places to film in the state include Murray Bridge and Victor Harbor, Two Wells and Mallala.
“The Pichi Richi Pass goes without saying, the Flinders Ranges, the mountains there, the scenery, it’s just incredible,” he said.
“If you want to hear some good noises, Mount Lofty or even Mount Barker Junction [are] two nice spots for S-bends and loud engines.”
Always cast as the villains in the popular children’s program Thomas the Tank Engine, the vintage diesel engines from the 1940s and 50s are some of Mr Stevenson’s favourites.
“It’s the start of the early diesel era, the end of the steam era; a lot of the videos and pictures from that time you will see steam engines that are on their last guts being put through their paces or diesels absolutely covered in filth from all the steam engines around them. That’s the golden era,” he said.
Mr Stevenson said while he did not keep a written list of the trains he had seen, he did mentally tick them off, and sometime relied on friend and fellow train buff Stewart Whiteaker who keeps all the details of their joint excursions.
“There was a Streamline engine that came through the Adelaide Hills a couple of months back. It was B61 with silver livery and I’d never seen it before and I was like, ‘I’ve got to go and see that’ because then I’ve seen it, it’s done, I don’t have to worry about it anymore,” he said.
While apps have become invaluable to people who like to track and film planes, Mr Stevenson said in the train community, word-of-mouth was what helped people work out the best locations to watch and film from.
“They might say, ‘Hey, just saw this train going through Nairne at this hour heading towards Adelaide’,” he said.
“And you go, ‘Cool, I know roughly it will take 30 minutes to get here, I’ll go to this spot’.”
Hope for long journeys ahead
Mr Stevenson’s “secret shame” is that while he has seen and recorded them frequently, he has never ridden on the The Ghan between Darwin and Adelaide or the Great Southern from Brisbane to Adelaide.
“I do want to find the time and money for the Ghan,” he said.
“I feel like it’s a quintessential experience going across that part of Australia. I’ve done the old Ghan on the Pichi Richi and that’s fantastic, but I reckon having a look in those carriages and having a good ride would be something else.”
As he continues to film and post, Mr Stevenson has been gathering more more followers from interstate and overseas, with fans in India, America, the UK, Sri Lanka and Canada all interested to see South Australia’s trains.
He said he realised only in recent years that people really enjoyed also seeing the suburban Adelaide trains that he had overlooked as “a bit boring”, while others found them interesting and even nostalgic.
“I had a gentleman comment and say, ‘This is really nice, it’s like being back home in Adelaide’, so it’s nice to have that impact on people,” he said.
