Akaroa

New Zealand

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Akaroa, community, eastern South Island, New Zealand. It is situated on the shore of French Bay, inside Akaroa Harbour, which is a rocky inlet on the Banks Peninsula formed when the sea breached the erosion-enlarged crater of an ancient volcano. The town’s name derives from the Maori for “long harbour.”

In 1838 a French whaler, Captain Jean Langlois, agreed with the local Maori chiefs to buy 30,000 acres (12,000 hectares) of the peninsula. He returned to France to organize the Nanto-Bordelaise Company (1839), which, backed by a warship, dispatched a settlement force. Arriving in 1840, the settlers found that the British had in the interim declared sovereignty over South Island. An agreement reached between the French and the British allowed the company to establish its settlement, which was sold to the New Zealand government in 1849.

The settlement serves a fruit- and dairy-farming area. A summer resort and fishing port, Akaroa lies 52 miles (84 km) by road southeast of Christchurch. Pop. (2001) 576; (2006) 570.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Kenneth Pletcher.

Banks Peninsula

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Banks Peninsula

peninsula, New Zealand

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Banks Peninsula, peninsula in eastern South Island, New Zealand, extending 30 miles (48 km) into the Pacific Ocean. It is bounded by Pegasus Bay (north) and Canterbury Bight (south) and has a total land area of about 500 square miles (1,300 square km). Generally hilly, it rises as high as 3,012 feet (918 m) at Herbert Peak. The peninsula was originally an island formed by two contiguous volcanic cones but was joined to the mainland by sediments of the Waimakariri River. It was visited (1770) by Captain James Cook, who named it after Sir Joseph Banks, and it was surveyed by John Stokes (1850). In the early 19th century, whalers and sealers made use of Lyttelton and Akaroa harbours, occupying the breached craters of the volcanoes. Later in the century, the peninsula was stripped of its forests. Agriculture (sheep, grass seed, and garden products) is now the most important economic activity. Christchurch, the largest city of South Island, lies just northwest of the peninsula.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Amy Tikkanen.

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