Banks Peninsula

Banks Peninsula (Māori: Te Pātaka o Rākaihautū) is a rocky peninsula on the east coast of the South Island of New Zealand that was formed by two now-extinct volcanoes. It has an area of approximately 1,200 square kilometres (450 sq mi). It includes two large deep-water harbours — Lyttelton Harbour and Akaroa Harbour — and many smaller bays and coves. The South Island's largest city, Christchurch, is immediately north of the peninsula which, is administered by Christchurch City Council. The main settlements are Lyttelton and Akaroa. The peninsula's economy is based on fisheries, farming and tourism.

Māori were the first people to visit, and settle, the peninsula. The sparse population was reduced further following massacres by raiding parties of North Island Māori in 1830 and 1832. In 1770, explorer James Cook became the first European to sight the peninsula, which he mistook for an island, naming it after his ship's botanist Joseph Banks. From the 1830s, European whalers set up shore-based stations in some of the bays and harbours. European interest in the permanent settlement of the area developed in the 1830s, and in 1840 a small French settlement was established in Akaroa Harbour, which lasted for around ten years. In the late 1840s, the Canterbury Association in England chose the central South Island as the site for a model English colony with Christchurch, just north of the peninsula, as its capital. Banks Peninsula was not part of the original land purchase for the colony but Port Cooper (now known as Lyttelton Harbour) was to be its port and point of entry. The first 800 settlers arrived in December 1850.

Lyttelton is the working port of Christchurch. Leisure and environmental activities on the peninsula are popular.