You may be wondering when this shot above was taken last week – a week that was a lot less like summer in little old Otepoti than it suggests. While the North Island was baking in a heatwave, firing along the entire east coast thanks to that cyclone swell and generally running for cover from the summer sun, Otepoti was like a late Autumn chiller. And there was no sun. Okay, if you were lucky you may have seen a bright orb veiled by a thin layer of cloud on Sunday for a fleeting moment.
But Monday. In a cruel twist, the day the kids return to school, summer steams into the city and its beaches look about as perfect as you could get ... and mostly empty apart from a handful of students acclimatising to their new beaches.
The lack of surfers harvesting the blue peaks is understandable. The cyclone swell had pumped for almost 10 days – delivering a north, north east, east and then south east swell to our fabled coastlines. You had to be on your game to find the peaks of it all, but if you tracked this long-lived groundie well then you reaped the rewards. It never got big, like it did for our friends in Coromandel and Bay of Plenty, but we certainly had lots of opportunity.
More swell this coming week if these reports are anything to go by and it looks like summer might just stick around for a little longer.
See you at the beach ... Derek
PS The Regent Theatre is following on from the success of the NZ International and Banff Mountain Film Festivals every year to line up a series of movies in this amazing Dunedin theatre. First up is Singin’ in the Rain, which will screen twice on Thursday 18th February, at 10.30am and 7pm. Check out the line up here: www.regenttheatre.co.nz
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