On Wednesday, December 24, 2014 2:06:19 AM UTC, RW wrote:
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.

HI Rupert and a Merry Christmas. The bad thing about onshore winds in this part of the world are summer fogs/haars/sea frets. Real spoilers!