CHRISTCHURCH — 6th March, 2021

We left this morning by bus at 9.30am to go to the coastal town of Sumner. Lovely beach area where lots of kids were out surfing. A couple of big groups of surfing classes, being Saturday, were taking place. Another  hot sunny day so heeps of people out walking swimming  and eating at the beach cafe.

Spent some time walking up and  down Sumners boardwalk, which runs the length of the large surfing beach.  More work had been done out there re the tidy up of the huge cliffs that had crumbled down with the quake. We then hopped onto the bus back into the city to go and have a look at the larger areas that the earthquake hit eg CTV building probably the biggest loss of life. We did do this area in 2013 but really wanted to see what it looked like today to see how much progress to see if any. It seems not a lot of difference but all the area had been cleared, some still fenced off. Block after block and some streets that have been shut off still waiting to be re developed.  It seems to be so long to get anything done always some legal hold up. It all looks a massive empty area going no where. I will explain more as I upload the photos. Very sad 😥

Hopped on another bus back to base arriving back about 2.30pm exhausted. Big walking day. We walked just over 7km and it was very hot but lucky there was a nice breeze. It’s being a great way  to get around Christchurch by bus. Costs nothing and works well after we got used to it on the first day. The hard part was wearing the marks in the bus as they are not air conditioned and with the sun streaming through the windows one gets very hot 🥵 under those 😷. We were spending quiet a bit of time on the buses. One to get us into town then our transfer to another to get us out to the places we were going to.

Although this week in Christchurch wasn’t originally planned we have had a great time and have done and seen so much of Christchurch. The only thing we didn’t get round to doing was to see the Punt rides on the Avon river. And a drive out to Avonside,as we didn’t have a car, which is an area we saw in 2013. This area was the worst hit residential area and everyone was evacuated from their houses. I would have liked to see what happen to this area. Maybe if we have time when we arrive back into Christchurch on our last day we might be able to fit in a drive around before we return our motorhome. To look at the Punt boat rides were on my list of things to do today but after sitting in hot buses and walking a lot just couldn’t last any longer to stretch the day out further.  Really enjoyed today covered a lot of ground. 

Above and below the unstable cliffs around the Sumner beach area. They have reinforced the bottom of the cliff with big boulders . Road runs along the front.

We got off the bus at the beach in Sumner and these geraniums  confronted us. What beauties, I can’t grow them like that. Beautiful

 

Cave Rock sits in the middle of the beach. looking at it from the south side.

Looking back at Rock Cave.

Looking south along the beach

Down the south end of Sumner beach looking north.

This clock down the south end of the beach was built in 1937. But  just recently it has had some quake damage repairs. We could see the patches where it had been repaired.

We then walked back from the clock end of the beach back to have a coffee at this cafe beside Cave rock.

Looking north up the beach from the cafe.

This is an old photo I took in 2013 two years after the Quake. (terrible quality compare to today’s photo below) you will see all the containers lined up below the cliffs put there to protect the road( which you can’t see) from falling rocks. Also notice how some of the houses are  almost balancing on the cliff edge.

Now today all the houses have been totally taken away and reinforcement of rocks have been  placed along the bottom of the cliffs to protect the road.

We have continued to the end of the beach and can now see the entrance  to the lagoon which  which is formed by the long spit which starts back up at New Brighton.

We have now walked around the corner from the beach looking back to the continuation of the high cliffs with lots of damage. On the left is the entrance to the lagoon where the water rushes through.

Entrance to the lagoon, Sumner beach on the right and the Spit on the left. It doesn’t look far (approximately 200m) but I don’t think that you could swim across as the tidal movement is fast.

Just along further looking at the lagoon PT took this photo where he used to sail when he was 14 years.

Hi Guys

Further along in the next little town  another photo I took in 2013. More houses very close to the edge of the cliff. The containers were placed under the cliffs to stop falling rocks going down on the road which runs in front of the containers.

A closer look at the cliffs above. Those houses were so close to falling. Must have been a big job clearing them.

This is what it looks like today.

At the time there was a school under these cliffs . The kids were still attending school with houses all along the top of the cliff  some practically just hanging over. The school must have closed down later and removed when they  started to destroy the houses at the top of the cliff. 

After our continued walk around the coast from Sumner we caught a bus into town to go to see some of the old places we saw in 2013 to see how they were looking. Above this unstable, unused building has had some containers placed beside it for protection of the road incase there is movement in the the building. They would’ve Ji placed there after the quake.

Another  building protected with containers awaiting to see if they are going to pull it down or repair it.

This is what is happening around town ten years on. Building waiting to hear what is going to happen to them.!!

The above and below photo is a huge area all fenced off awaiting  permission to start building  a stadium to be build like Dunedin’s glass top one. Things seem to take so long. So much vacant land awaiting time. A lot of plots are used as paid car parks in the meantime.

This is the remains of the Catholic Church in 2013.

They have waited all this time to decide if it can be saved. It has been decided it can’t, so they have started pulling it down as shown in the two photos below. 

The remains of the old church is fenced in with a razor sharp fence.

As below these 185 chairs have been place in remembrance  of the 185 people who were killed in the quake.

PT stopped a local lady, as he often does to ask information about a place. After talking to her for awhile she said hop in the car and I will take you to the couple of places you want to see. It was so kind of her and she could probably see how hot and tired we were looking from trying to do all these places on foot. This lady told us a story of a couple she knew in their seventies who at the time they were travelling in a city bus and a building fell on the bus. When their daughter heard about the quake she rushed around to their house, which was in Sumner where we went today,  this area also was one of the worst areas to be hit. She didn’t hear from them until she heard the news of her parents. What a sad end. There must be so many stories like this.

Another old photo of the site where the CTV building fell from 2013. Then it was all fenced off and you couldn’t go in there due to respect to the families.

The same area today as above they have now made it a lovely area as a memorial.

The CTV memorial in the area above.

Very sad so many like this

Another 2013 photo. This is what they call the cardboard church they were building for a replacement of the  Christchurch Cathedral when it was destroyed. It cost $5,000,000 to build. At the time we, and many of the locals, thought this is a waste of money for something  that was only going to be temporary until the Cathedral was rebuilt, thinking that would have happen a lot sooner. But as it happened they are still waiting for the rebuild.

This is what it looks like now. 

Lovely area in the city New Regent Street. The tram runs through here but is now closed for cars.

Another look back up the street. Well done with the Art Deco buildings with shops and cafes underneath them

Just remembered that I didn’t get a photo of a tram. Just got a shot before it disappeared down the street.

Well that’s the end of a very long interesting day. We have noticed a lot of changes since we saw it in 2013. But also we have noticed a lot of areas that are still the same, as they haven’t started any work on them over the last ten years.  We have really enjoyed our uninspected time in Christchurch and we are now ready to start our motorhome holiday tomorrow. Really looking forward to that for another three weeks.