On Wednesday, 24 December 2014 08:16:45 UTC+13, Nick Gardner wrote:

For the last 9 years that I have been recording sunshine here near near
the south coast of Devon we have averaged around 1850 to 2000 hours of
sunshine a year.

The biggest factor is the supression of cumulus cloud in the spring,
summer and early autumn through regular sea breezes. Often the sky is
cloudless here whereas just a few kilometres inland cumulus builds up
and there may even be showers/thunder, especially in the spring.

Higher ground to the west also helps.

--
Nick Gardner
Otter Valley (and with beavers too), Devon
20 m amsl
http://www.ottervalley.co.uk

Interesting. There is only a small bit of NZ's coastline where that sort of thing would be seen much, and in those cases steep hills or mountain ranges would not be far away.