My day as a tour guide
One of the benefits of doing freelance work is having the flexibility to arrange my working week around other things that are important to me (like cycling). And when I have time between contracts, I can take advantage of opportunities that come up without having to schedule them weeks in advance.
So, when an international reader emailed to say they would be in Christchurch the following week and would I like to go for a ride, it was easy for me to say ‘yes’ and jump at the chance to play guide.
Colleen first contacted me last year when she was planning her trip to New Zealand with husband Ian. She wanted to know which of several Great Rides I would recommend. (My post on choosing which New Zealand cycle trail to ride was inspired by her email.) I was interested to find out which trails she had opted for and how she found them.
For their Christchurch stay, Colleen and Ian had booked a half-day guided cycle tour along the Ōtākaro Avon River to the sea and were thinking about another cycle tour around the city centre. But I suggested they just hire the bikes and have me as their guide instead - it’s a ride I do often, and a great way to get a feel for the impact of the 2010-11 earthquakes on the city (as well as being a scenic ride).
Colleen agreed and we arranged to meet at the bike shop to collect the bikes. I was conscious the shop might have lost some tour business that day so I was quick to assure the owner that no, I wasn’t a guide and had just offered to show them around. But he wasn’t at all concerned and even asked if I wanted a job doing casual guiding work. (Colleen later told me the shop didn't have a guide available to take them along the river to the sea anyway.)
I love meeting people who love cycling. I’m hoping Colleen will share her own story in another post, so I won’t say much about Colleen and Ian’s trip to New Zealand, or the other places they have cycled. But I will tell you they are from Canada, and that Colleen has been writing about cycling for 20 years on her Let’s Go Biking site. She’s published three books on rides around Vancouver and British Columbia (which I’ve since checked out, and they are fantastic).
Colleen and Ian hired bikes for the full day for our Christchurch tour so we had plenty of time. We started with a leisurely ride around Hagley Park, which is a much-loved space in the heart of the city used for sports, recreation and events. The park covers a huge area (165 hectares) and is protected from development by legislation. Local residents keep a close eye on the park, so woe betide anyone who proposes it be used for anything other than “the enjoyment of the public”.
We circled around the northern half of the park and past the Botanic Gardens and hospital to the Antigua Boatsheds. The boatsheds are one of the oldest remaining buildings in the city centre and a popular spot for hiring canoes, kayaks or rowboats. It’s also a great place for watching the punts and their snazzily-dressed punters go by.
From here, we followed the shared pathway along the Ōtākaro Avon River through central Christchurch, stopping at points of interest along the way. We passed by the Canterbury Earthquake National Memorial, etched with the names of the 185 people who lost their lives in the 2011 earthquake. We cycled past the popular Riverside Market, full of local eateries, and we stopped briefly by the Bridge of Remembrance, built after the first world war and damaged, but left standing, by the earthquake.
We admired some of the striking new buildings constructed after the earthquakes, such as Te Pae, Christchurch’s new convention centre, designed to reflect the region’s alps and braided rivers. We peered into the now-desolate Cathedral Square and watched an old car park building being demolished - once a common sight in the wake of the earthquakes, this was one of the first demolitions I’ve seen for some time.
We cycled past the Christchurch Town Hall, built in the 1970s, known for excellent acoustics in the main auditorium, and host to many performances and graduation ceremonies over the years. The building faced an uncertain future after the earthquakes, but the people of Christchurch and the city council put up a fight to ensure it was restored.
And we cycled through the marvellous Margaret Mahy playground - like Te Pae, one of ten anchor projects identified after the earthquakes to bring people back into the city centre. The playground is named after New Zealand children’s author, Margaret Mahy, and designed for children of all ages and abilities. Christchurch had nothing like it before the earthquakes, and it’s been enormously successful in attracting families into the city.
All the time we followed the river. This brought us to the edge of the city centre and the start of the transitional trail, Te Ara Ōtākaro Avon River Trail, which continues along the river to the sea. I’ve described this trail before, so I won’t do it again, other than to say that it goes through what was known as the ‘residential red zone’. This is a 602-hectare area of land along the river corridor that was so badly damaged during the Canterbury earthquakes that the Government decided to buy and demolish the more than 5,000 houses located there.
Colleen and Ian were aware of what had happened but there is nothing like seeing for yourself all the empty sections, and the remains of the twisted Medway bridge, to appreciate the force of the earthquakes and the scale of the damage that occurred.
We arrived in New Brighton by the sea at lunchtime so still had plenty of time in the day for cycling. I had planned to return to the city on the other side of the river, but Colleen and Ian were keen to keep exploring so we headed to the estuary instead. We followed the shared path around the water’s edge and then decided we might as well carry on around the other side (via the ‘poo ponds’1 and an industrial area) to the recently completed Coastal Pathway.
Te Ara Ihutai Christchurch Coastal Pathway starts on the southern side of the estuary and winds around the base of the hills to the seaside suburb of Sumner. It’s a wide shared pathway, built in stages over the past ten years and finally completed in late 2023. As with many new developments, the pathway is a legacy of the earthquakes, which provided the impetus for improving city infrastructure and better connecting communities.
We enjoyed wonderful water views as we made our way to Sumner. We also saw plenty of reminders of the earthquakes - exposed cliff faces, fenced off to protect people (and vehicles) from falling rocks; stunning new buildings like the Sumner surf clubhouse and the new Redcliffs school, forced to relocate due to rockfall on the school grounds; and the sad remnants of the once-distinctive Shag Rock at Sumner Beach (now better known as the ‘shag pile’).
After a short ice-cream break, it was time to return to the city. We cycled back along the coastal pathway to Ferrymead and connected to one of the city’s major cycleways to take us back to the city centre. We arrived at Cathedral Junction, home base for the city’s trams, and passed through lovely New Regent Street, with its distinctive and beautifully restored Spanish Mission-style buildings, before cycling on to return the bikes.
It was a great day (despite a cold and windy start) and we had a relaxed leisurely ride. We ended up covering a lot of ground - 53 kilometres - which you can see here in Colleen’s record of our ride.
Epilogue
I really enjoyed showing Colleen and Ian around the city by bike. They were great company and experienced cyclists, so I didn’t worry about their safety on the roads. And I discovered that my experience of having lived through the earthquakes and having worked for both the city council and the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority meant I was well-placed to explain the change the city had been through (and is still going through).
Reflecting on my day, I thought that perhaps I might enjoy some casual guiding work after all. So, I got in back in touch with Stu at Chill (the bike shop) for a chat and ended up joining one of his Urban Explorer tours to see what it was all about. And I loved it.
I’ve since done a first aid course (a prerequisite for the job) and tagged along on another tour and I am hoping to lead one of my own soon. My desk job will always take priority, but if I can fit in the occasional tour, then I will.
If you’re coming to Christchurch and want to explore the city by bike, please do get in touch like Colleen did. I can’t promise I will be free to show you around myself, but I can certainly offer some advice and connect you to the good folk at Chill.
These are the oxidation ponds for the city’s wastewater treatment plant, and not at all as unpleasant as the nickname suggests. The birds love them.
Lucky Colleen and Ian. What a fab day out. Wish we’d ’hired’ you in Christchurch. The local info you provide is what makes the journey so interesting.
Congratulations on your burgeoning career. You will be awesome 👏 🏆 xx
This sounds like so much fun!