Winter Wonderland

The West Coast is a temperate rainforest area and does not experience extremes of temperature. Summer temperatures are relatively mild and in winter severely cold days are rare. Snow falls on the Southern Alps but there is usually no prolonged disruption to traffic over the mountain passes. Only occasionally does snow fall near the coast. Winter is usually fairly fine on the Coast so there are many beautiful clear days with views of the snow-clad Southern Alps. Fine weather brings frosts and that provides an opportunity for photography in the form of frosted forests and scrubland, ice patterns in water, icicles in waterfalls and foliage coated in icicles.