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Pichi Richi society keep alive steam train travel experience of Central Australia Railway in the Flinders Ranges

Pichi Richi society keep alive steam train travel experience of Central Australia Railway in the Flinders Ranges
The Pichi Richi railway experiences revive steam train travel experiences through the lower Flinders Ranges of South Australia.
Image courtesy Pichi Richi Railway Preservation Society

The award-winning Pichi Richi Railway Preservation Society has kept alive 39 kilometres of line between Port Augusta and Quorn  –a section of the Central Australia Railway built between Port Augusta and Government Gums (Farina) in South Australia’s north in 1878.

The original Central Australia Railway narrow gauge line was superseded by a standard gauge line from Stirling North (near Port Augusta) to Maree (372km from Port Augusta) in 1975. The new line also bypassed Quorn station and locomotive depot that became a museum central to Pichi Richi Railway Preservation Society’s work since 1973. 

The society, managed and staffed by volunteer members, has fully restored a fleet of South Australian Railways, Commonwelth Railways and Western Australian Government Railways steam and diesel locomotives, passenger and freight rolling stock. The society progressively restored the railway to Summit (1974), Pichi Richi (1974), Woolshed Flat (1979) and Stirling North (1999) on the original alignment, and to Port Augusta (2001) on a new alignment between Stirling North and Port Augusta.

Pichi Richi, a pass and former township on the rail route, originally believed to refer to the region as the traditional centre producing pituri, a mix of leaves and ash chewed as a stimulant by Aboriginal people. The Pichi Pichi volunteers have completed major projects, including restoring steam locomotives and heritage rolling stock, rebuilding large sections of railway line and permanent way, and restoring historic buildings.

Among the steam locomotives brought back to life was Commonwealth Railways’ NM25, built in 1925 and was used on the narrow gauge line between Port Augusta and Alice Springs. One of only two surviving examples of this class of steam locomotive, NM25 had been left neglected from 1965 until 1989 when the society bought it and recommissioned it 2003.

Also a major task was returning narrow gauge train services into Port Augusta, starting with 16 kilometres of track being rehabilitated between Woolshed Flat and Stirling North. The next phase was reinstating a narrow gauge line parallel to the standard gauge into Port Augusta, and Platform 2 at its station. The rail for this project was sourced from the dismantled Cambrai to Apamurra railway line in South Australia's Murray Mallee. A turntable from Kapunda was installed near Port Adelaide station, as well as a depot and sheds to house a locomotive and rolling stock for Pichi Richi Railway operations originating at Port Augusta.

Pichi Richi Railway Preservation Society presented railway experiences from the past with the Afghan Express, a return trip to Quorn from Port Augusta. This train usually was Ghan carriages from the 1920s and often hauled by an original Ghan steam locomotive, NM25, recreating travel in the 1930s and 1940s.

A shorter journey, the Pichi Richi Explorer, was a return service to Woolshed Flat departing from Quorn.  Travel on this train was in South Australian Railway (SAR) carriages circa 1900 to 1915 hauled by a steam locomotive or in a 1928 SAR diesel railcar. Older SAR rollingstock on this train replicated what it was like to travel by country rail in South Australia in the early 1900s to the 1960s.

 Other special services include occasional “double header” steam trains, and dinner trains originating in Port Augusta and stopping at the trackside Willows Brewery Restaurant en route to Quorn. A new service introduced in 2010 saw guests dining on the train in a first class dining carriage, with a three-course meal prepared in the carriage's kitchen by a local hotel's chef. Trains and carriages were also available for private hire.

The society’s efforts have been honoured with a series of tourism awards.

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