I awake to the sound of wind thundering down the chimney. Dwarfed in the timber-framed bed, I lie still and watch shadowy witch-fingered tree branches dancing behind the drapes. The digital clock glows midnight.

As my eyes flick from the cavernous ceilings to the shadowy outlines of Victorian furniture, my mind wanders to the history of my lodgings: The Charlotte Jane boutique hotel.

Constructed in 1891, this building was originally the family home of a Mr Frederick Gibson, who arrived in Lyttelton from Hull, England in 1863. In 1890 Gibson purchased this pocket of Christchurch land in order to build a home for his wife and 10 children. Adjacent to the home, Gibson established the family's own educational institute - Miss Gibson's Private School for Girls.

The grand property, encompassing the home and school, was dubbed 'Rangi Ruru' by a local Maori chief, which translates as 'wide sky shelter'.

By 1900, Miss Gibson's Private School for Girls had a roll of 25 students including eight boarders. The school continued to grow steadily to the point where, in 1923, it was forced to relocate to a nearby site. Miss Gibson's Private School for Girls still sits on that site today, where it operates as Rangi Ruru Girls' School.

The name 'The Charlotte Jane' wasn't used until 1995 when German couple Moira and Seigfried Lindlbauer purchased the building with a view to establishing a boutique hotel. The name stems from the first of the four settler ships to arrive in Lyttelton from England in the 1800s. The other three ships 'The Cressy', 'The George Seymour' and 'The Randolph' are represented by room names in the charming hotel.

The Charlotte Jane and Rangi Ruru Girls' School are just two of many institutions cradling Christchurch's past within their restored walls. By the light of a post-storm day I set out to discover more.

At Victoria Square, a bustling, vibrant green park that was originally the city's central market place, I board the historic Christchurch tram. Nose-tickling dust and the sharp scent of leather fill the long cabin, swirling comfortingly around the honeyed timber seats and up to the white arched ceilings. Polished chrome window fittings glint in the sunshine. In the late 19^th century, trams were a fixture of central Christchurch. Steam and horses provided the vehicles' momentum until 1905 when the first electric tram was introduced. In 1954, sadly, the last of the city's regular tram cars was removed from service.

Ninety years on, the trams were back - albeit as a quaint visitor attraction - lovingly restored and once again carting day-trippers and visitors around the city centre. With a rattle and a ding, we're off, wiggling along the 2.5km city circuit.

We lumber gently down New Regent Street - Christchurch's first 'mall' - where pastel-hued shops teeter in Spanish Mission style terraced architecture. Tiny wrought iron balconies peek out from the second storey. Below, brunchers loll at small outdoor tables scattered along the tiled street. When it was established during the Depression, New Regent Street was an anomaly in that the entire street was built as one commercial unit - something unprecedented in 1930s' New Zealand.

At nearby Cathedral Square, the iconic Christ Church Cathedral stands to attention, piercing the blue sky with its 27m high spire. From its prominent position at the edge of the city square, the 104-year-old cathedral watches all: the pair of warbling buskers surrounded by a square of onlookers; the flapping rainbow colours of a craft market; the neatly paved Worcester Boulevard carrying us over the Avon River. I look down to see sleek punts gliding effortlessly past willows that weep their whip-thin branches into the sparkling water.

The tram rolls to a stop outside the delightfully rambling Arts Centre complex. Beneath the pitched rooves and brick facades of the Gothic Revival buildings shoppers dart through the thronging Arts Centre Market. Tourists amble across grassy quadrangles and through mazes of long halls, seeking out craft boutiques that were once the lecture halls and laboratories of the University of Canterbury.

Much like The Charlotte Jane, the Arts Centre began its life as an educational facility in the 1800s. After the founding of the university in 1873, the site extended gradually to include Christchurch Girls' High School, then Christchurch Boys', specialist blocks for engineering, classics and chemistry as well as a students' association building. By 1974 - a century after its inauguration - the university had outgrown the site and moved to its current Ilam location.

Having offloaded a number of passengers at the Arts Centre, the tram clickety-clacks onwards, past the Canterbury Museum, historic Christ's College and an entrance to Hagley Park. The 165-hectare park was set aside in the city's original 1850s plan as a space, "reserved forever as a public park [which] shall be open for recreation and enjoyment". Glancing out the window I can see that this ruling is still faithfully adhered to - although I'm not sure the founding fathers would have envisaged the scantily-clad power walkers, rollerblading families and marching mums-with-prams parading through the park today!

It is these juxtapositions between old and new that make Christchurch city so eclectically charming. And as we continue along the tram line I notice more and more: the tiny lead-lit 1920s hotels facing sharp, contemporary apartment complexes; a fluorescent ice cream truck touting outside the historic stone Canterbury Provincial Chambers; and semi-naked acrobats swinging on ropes above an aged marble statue of Captain James Cook.

Times have certainly changed here in central Christchurch. And yet, you don't have to look too hard to see that 150 years on, many things have stayed remarkably the same.

Amelia visited Christchurch and stayed at The Charlotte Jane courtesy of Christchurch & Canterbury Tourism and www.fourcorners.co.nz.

All images copyright Photo New Zealand.