Pegasus Bay  Pegasus Bay, earlier known as Cook's Mistake, is a bay on the east coast of the South Island of New Zealand. The bay has a sandy beach and runs from Banks Peninsula to the Waipara River mouth. The city of Christchurch is at the southern end of the bay. Other than dolphins including the endemic, endangered Hector's dolphins that regularly live or visit into the waters, whales such as southern right and humpback are known to migrate into the gulf. Rivers flowing into Pegasus Bay, from north to south, are:  The "Pegasus" was the name of the sailing ship which surveyed part of the South Island in 1809. The brig "Pegasus" was the former "Pegaso", captured at the Peruvian port of Trujillo on 28 July 1807 by the British frigate , commanded by Captain Charles James Johnston, during a cruise against Spanish shipping and ports along the coasts of Spanish America. Johnston dispatched "Pegaso" to Port Jackson, where she arrived at the end of October. Submitted to the Court of Admiralty in Sydney, "Pegaso", was condemned as a prize on 24 January 1808 and sold off, renamed "Pegasus". A few months later she was acquired by Thomas Moore and in May of that year she was made ready to go on the sealing trade to the southern part of New Zealand. This expedition took place between August 1898 and March 1809, when "Pegasus" was commanded by Captain Eber Bunker. "Pegasus" went on a second expedition under the command of Samuel Chase from Port Jackson to London by way of the sealing grounds in southern New Zealand from May 1809 to August 1810: William W. Stewart was first officer and made charts of the New Zealand coast, including Stewart Island, which was subsequently named after him. William Stewart gave Pegasus Bay its name. The captain of the ship, Captain Samuel Chase (not to be confused with his contemporary, Captain Samuel Rodman Chace), lays claim to correcting James Cook's charts by determining that "Banks Island" was in fact a peninsula. As late as 1843, the bay was referred to as Cook's Mistake. The MV Pegasus Bay was also the final name of a container ship that operated with a variety of owners from 1978 to 2002. It was made into a Triang model ship under another name, MV City of Durban.