The weather has been terrible. The weather has been bad. The weather has been freezing cold and drenchingly wet up and down the country these past few days, leaving New Zealanders to do what New
Steve Braunias: Cold it may be, but Kiwis take it all in their stride
Alan Coull, a lawyer in Cromwell, was also keeping close to the fire. "It's tried to snow," he said. "I saw it come over the top of the Remarkables and there were snowflakes in the air. It looked moody and very ominous. I thought, 'I'll sit by the fire with a Scotch.' But that was it. Just a bit of a dusting."
Further south, the snow was thick on the ground, said Pam van der Watt of the Fouveaux Hotel in Bluff. She drove to Invercargill on Sunday, and said, "That was super scary. The roads were horrid. Everyone was driving very, very slowly. Invercargill was covered in snow."
Asked if the weather was any better on the Monday, she said she couldn't really say. "The housekeeper's been off sick, and I've been inside all day, running up and down the stairs, changing the beds and vacuuming the carpets."
The 6pm TV news was led during the weekend with dramatic pictures of high swells in Westport, and its worrying erosion of the coastal foreshore.
"Yeah well all of New Zealand's eroding away, isn't it," said Chris Cooper of Carters By the Sea Motel in Westport.
He was very defensive about it. "Yeah a bit of high seas and that. Nothing out of the normal ... I'll put the wife on."
Erica Cooper said, "It's actually been quite amazing. Extreme weather. Huge seas, with great big tops. But it hasn't been that cold. Right now? I'll stick my head out. Hang on." When she returned to the phone, she said, "It's raining. Just a bit of rain."