These photo's were taken on a steam excursion trip from Auckland to Whangerei and return. The train was hauled by Ka 942. The Ka class 484 was the biggest steam power used on the North Island Main Trunk and saw service during the 40's to 60's. This example has been restored by Mainline Steam. The Skyline and Front Valence were removed on many of the working locomotives during their operational life as they caused some maintenance problems.

This trip was the first time that this class of locomotive ventured onto the Northland line as a tunnel north of Kaukapakapa (pronounced cow copa copa) did not provide enough clearance. Later widening for container traffic made this trip possible. An interesting thing to note about this tunnel is that engineers began digging from each side but got their calculations wrong so that they didn't meet squarely in the middle. When you go through the tunnel the join is clearly visible.