The Perfect 2 to 3 Day Christchurch Itinerary

Christchurch is compact enough to cross on foot in a morning, which means two or three days there is really two or three days in Canterbury. The city takes one. The rest goes on the drives, and that is where the region earns its reputation. Here is how to split it.

What Should You Do on Day One in Christchurch?

Leave the car where it is. Everything worth seeing on the first day sits within about twenty minutes of the Avon.

Start with coffee in the central city and walk through the Botanic Gardens along the river. Riverside Market for brunch, the Cardboard Cathedral, the Christchurch Art Gallery and a ride on the tram will fill the day without you moving the car once.

The afternoon is when it earns its keep. The Port Hills are twenty minutes out and put you above the city with Lyttelton Harbour on the far side. Drive up towards the Gondola or along Summit Road and stop wherever the view opens up, which is often.

Finish on New Regent Street. It is a short pastel terrace of restaurants and bars and it is the best looking corner of the city once the light goes. If you are here in February, that is also the weekend the whole city fills up for Electric Avenue, which is worth planning around either way.

Is Akaroa Worth the Drive?

It is the best day of the three, and it is 1 hour 20 minutes each way.

Akaroa sits out across the Banks Peninsula on a road that climbs and winds the whole way, with the harbour opening up beneath you on the descent. The town was founded in 1840 to be the administrative centre of a French annexation of the South Island. The annexation never happened. The French stayed, and it is still in the street names and the cooking.

Walk the harbour front, eat properly, and get on the water. Hector's dolphins live in the harbour and cruises go out to see them. They are a New Zealand species and a rare one, so it is not the usual tourist boat trip. Onuku Church, the Akaroa Museum and the lighthouse fill whatever is left of the day.

Driving yourself is most of the point here. The lookouts on the way over are worth as much as the town at the end of it, and none of them are stops on anyone's schedule but yours.

Should You Add Arthur's Pass on Day Three?

If you like mountains and do not mind a long day, yes. Two hours out, two hours back.

Arthur's Pass National Park is two hours from Christchurch on State Highway 73, and DOC's own pitch for it is that above the bushline you can see snow tussock and alpine meadows on a short walk off the road at the summit. You do not have to earn the view.

The drive is as much of it as the destination. Farmland turns into braided rivers and then into alpine peaks in the space of a morning, and the road itself is the reason people do this as a day trip rather than a stop.

Two things DOC is firm about. The weather changes rapidly with little warning, so go prepared for wet and cold even in summer. And there is a history of cars being broken into at track ends, so take everything with you rather than leaving it in the boot. DOC also records avalanche activity through the park from May to November, and the road over the pass is a genuine alpine one, so Snow Chains 101 is worth reading before you set off in those months.

What If You Have Longer Than Three Days?

Lake Tekapo, and give it a night rather than a day.

Tekapo sits inland from Christchurch on the road towards Queenstown, inside the Aoraki Mackenzie International Dark Sky Reserve, New Zealand's largest. That is the reason to stay the night rather than drive through. The Church of the Good Shepherd, built in 1935 and still an active place of worship, is the photograph everyone takes, and there are hot pools for the evening.

If you are carrying on to Queenstown from there, the four stops worth building that drive around covers the rest of the route.

In winter the same trip turns into a ski one. Mt Hutt is the Canterbury field, close enough to base yourself in Christchurch or out at Methven, and where to head this winter covers it alongside the rest of the country's mountains.

Do You Need a Car in Christchurch?

Not for day one. For everything after that, yes.

The city is walkable and has a tram, and you would be paying for a car to sit still. Akaroa, Arthur's Pass and Tekapo are a different question. The stopping on the way is most of what makes them worth doing, and that is the part you cannot do on somebody else's timetable. Three days of this adds up to a fair bit of road, which is why hiring a hybrid is worth a thought on a Canterbury trip.

Getting a Car for a Christchurch Trip

Evolve is a Queenstown and Auckland company and we do not have a counter in Christchurch. What we do is the one way. You start with us in Queenstown or Auckland, drive down, and finish here, and we sort the drop off with you directly rather than leaving you to work it out. How a one way drop off works has the detail.

It suits a proper South Island trip rather than a weekend, which is the kind of thing this itinerary belongs to anyway. Book with Evolve Rentals and tell us where you want to finish.

FAQs

How many days do you need in Christchurch?
Two or three. One for the city, which is walkable, and the rest for Akaroa and Arthur's Pass, which are both day trips by car.

How far is Akaroa from Christchurch?
1 hour 20 minutes, out across the Banks Peninsula. Allow longer than that, because you will stop on the way.

How far is Arthur's Pass from Christchurch?
Two hours each way on State Highway 73, according to DOC. It makes a full day rather than a half one.

Can I hire a car from Evolve in Christchurch?
Not from a counter there, because we are based in Queenstown and Auckland. We do arrange one way trips that finish in Christchurch, so you collect from us at the start and drop off at the end. Get in touch with your dates and starting point.

Is Christchurch walkable?
The central city is, easily. The Botanic Gardens, Riverside Market, the Art Gallery and New Regent Street are all within a short walk of each other, and there is a tram.