Pigeon Bay is a bay 20 km north-west of Akaroa. It was settled in the 1840s, before Christchurch was founded, by the Hay and Sinclair families. The village at its head survives as a cluster of houses and holiday homes.
Meaning of place name
So named by whalers because the forest at the bay was alive with keruru or wood pigeons.
Source: nzhistory.govt.nz