Railfan Stories

Recap: I set out late on May 7 / early on May 8 to photograph the Milky Way, photograph the grain elevator at Oberon at night, and see some trains. I drove from Winnipeg to Oberon and Brookdale, just north of Carberry. The sun has finally come up. Let’s continue. After taking my selfie at … Read more

I had to stop at the G3 grain elevator near Bloom to take a few photos. I didn’t want to linger – night was ending soon – but I wanted to photograph it night. I set up the tripod and took six shots at various exposures and let Adobe Lightroom merge them into one image.

I’ve been trying to photograph the Milky Way for some time now. My wife and I have gone out aurora chasing a few times this spring and, although we have had success photographing the aurora, I haven’t been able to see the Milky Way. I think the two main reasons why we didn’t see it is because the moon was out, and we didn’t stay out late enough.

Canadian Pacific, like most railways, has its own business train that it uses for corporate and public relations purposes. It charters this train as the Royal Canadian Pacific – although I think that’s on hold for now – and it has been used for public events such as the Canada 150 tour. This week, however, … Read more

Rolling past the grain elevator under construction at Rosser, CP 9827 East faces the rising sun as it approaches Winnipeg. The track is laid in the new loop track, and soon track crews will return to put in the switches and signals to connect it to the main line to make way for 100+ car unit trains to serve the new, modern elevator. Word is that the old elevator will be retained for specialty crops.

I was acting on a little intel on May 1, 2021 when I went out in the late afternoon to make some train photos. A little birdie had told me that there were some interesting old switchers visible at the CN Transcona shops, and another little birdie told me that a CP heritage locomotive was … Read more

I was driving around one evening recently, roaming around the east side of Winnipeg looking for trains. I ended up with a few sunset drone photos of the Dugald grain elevator – both the old wooden one and the new Parrish & Heimbecker one under construction just east of the town. But no trains. Dejected, … Read more

This post follows Trains at Night. After driving around all night to see trains, your intrepid railfan ended up near Oakville, MB shortly before sunrise. It was turning out to be a beautiful morning and it was nice to be outside. The birds were back and making their presence known with a variety of songs. … Read more

I really like photographing at night. I enjoy the change in perspective, the challenge of photographing in scant light, the different techniques… I don’t do it enough. On April 3 I decided that I would try to capture the Milky Way.

I went out one afternoon to the CN main line to see what I could see. It turned out to be a pretty high traffic period, and I saw seven trains in ninety minutes. One 15:47 – First up was CN 2976 West. I was sitting near mile 16 of the CN Rivers subdivision and … Read more