This shot gives us a pretty clear indication of why the Anglican church originally wanted to demolish the Cathedral. Looking inside the thing like this, we see its shattered walls looking like something left over from the dark ages. Your mental cash register would HAVE to be tallying up the number of dollars that would need to be sunk into the building to get it back into a serviceable state.

As I mentioned in an earlier description, that price increased by about 50% between 2018 and 2022.

This shot also gives a wider angle of Cathedral Square, and you can see our hotel (as well as the building that was being (re?)built alongside it) in the left rear of the shot.

Some further research revealed that the building that's under construction is the Tūranga Christchurch City Libraries. It rises only about 3 stories, so it doesn't block out the views of those staying in the Novotel tower.

The Citizens' War Memorial is clearly visible on the left, and I'll come back to that in the next shot.