The Port Hills

Recreation and facilities

Sugarloaf Reserve

Sugarloaf Reserve and Coronation Hill.

Sugarloaf is one of the better-known Christchurch landmarks because of the television transmitter located at its peak. However, this reserve provides the people of Christchurch with much more than a picture on their TV screens.

From the car park at the base of the transmitter a panoramic view, unmatched in the Port Hills, is stretched out at the onlooker's feet. A vista taking in the seaward Kaikoura’s in the north to the Hunter Hills in the south and the Southern Alps to the west ranges across nearly 300 kilometres!

At only 10 km from Cathedral Square, Sugarloaf Reserve is one of the closest Port Hills Reserves to Christchurch, and is easily accessible. Walk along any of the excellent tracks that criss-cross the reserve and you will soon see that Sugarloaf Reserve has everything that makes the Port Hills so unique, within one relatively small area. Steep rocky crags overlooking the harbour give way to gently sloping tussock grassland with idyllic views over Christchurch. These in turn give way to open patches of scrub with a soft carpet of moss below.

Many native plants grow on the ledges below the bluffs, including one of the few manuka to be found on the Hills.

When you have had your fill of the stunning views, take a stroll along Cedrics Track around the base of Sugarloaf into the native plantation of adjoining Thomson Park. This was gifted to the people in 1931 by J. J. Thomson, a man reputed to have walked nearly 2500 km around the Hills in his lifetime. Follow in his footsteps along Cedrics Track which joins Mitchells Track on the Crater Rim Walkway, and Gilpins Track along which you can do a loop walk around Sugarloaf.

Access

Off Summit Road, east of Dyers Pass.