The Port Hills

Recreation and facilities

Sign of the Takahe and Cracroft Reserve

Sign of the Takahe and Cracroft Reserve.

History

Situated on Cracroft Reserve, the Sign of the Takahe is an historic building of national importance, planned by Harry (H.G.) Ell as the major building of a series of buildings. The buildings, envisaged as a series of staging points along an unbroken route to the Akaroa Summit, include the Victoria Park stone rotunda, the Sign of the Kiwi, the Sign of the Bellbird (1914) and the Sign of the Packhorse (1916), a stone hut lying on Crown land to the south of Mt. Bradley.

Harry Ell started his battle to create a unique hillside chain of buildings and reserves in 1908, but it was not until 1918 that the first stone was laid in what was to become known as The Sign of the Takahe. Originally intended to be a Dickensian inn, Ell eventually settled on a Gothic/Tudor baronial style after extensive research in the UK.

Through an extraordinary string of ups and downs, including financial disaster and Ell's death in 1934, the building was not completed to its present state until 1948. A masterpiece of improvisation and economic necessity, materials and tools were salvaged and scrounged from all over Canterbury. The stone was quarried from various sites along the Summit Road, some of the wood came from local sources of kauri and totara, and perhaps the best example, the huge kauri beams which span the lounge were salvaged from a former bridge across the Hurunui River.

The Sign of the Takahe Restaurant is open for luncheons, devonshire teas, silver service dining and functions.

A stainless steel plane table (completed in 1968 by the Rotary Club of Christchurch) is situated on a stone plinth at the high point of Cracroft Reserve. The skyline of the Southern Alps is engraved on the rim of the table and along with bearing lines, enables the sightseer to identify named peaks from Mt Tapuaenuku 200 km to the north, to Aoraki (Mt. Cook) 230 km to the south west.

The Harry Ell walking track commences about 200 metres above the Sign of the Takahe on Dyers Pass Road. This track runs along the edge of Elizabeth Park and Victoria Park, just above Dyers Pass Road, until it reaches Summit Road and the Sign of the Kiwi. From here a number of further walks can be embarked upon.

Access

Hackthorne Road, off Dyers Pass Road.

Nearest Bus

10 Harewood / Cashmere. For further information check out the Christchurch City Bus Services at metro info.