Where is Christchurch and what was it like in the 50s?
Christchurch is about 2/3 of the way up the eastern seaboard of New Zealand’s South Island. The city is bounded on the east by the Pacific Ocean and on the south by the Port Hills, which separate it from the port of Lyttelton, where the “ship” scenes were filmed. Victoria Park lies near the crest of the Port Hills, overlooking Christchurch and just south of the Christchurch suburb of Cashmere (no longer an ‘official’ suburb name). Farther to the south-east, past Lyttelton, are Port Levy, where the girls first saw the Fourth World, and the hills of the Banks Peninsula. Before European settlement, the city site was flat but gently sloping eastward, from stony ground in the west toward a coastal swamp drained by the meandering Avon and Heathcote rivers. To some extent the present courses of those rivers have been defined by drainage and channelling works made by the settlers. The town plan was drawn up before the Canterbury Company settlers arrived in 1850. The original town was laid out
