It has been a relatively warm winter this year with less snows falling or frosts in the morning.

On the 4th of August 2016, it happened to be one of the nights that the aurora was predicted to be large but also having snow warnings and icy roads.

While the solarwind was predicted to hit us strong, the sky was cloudy with mixture of snow and rain while the wind became stronger and while it became a blizzard.

While it was almost snowing but raining in Dunedin where I live, some people in Southland reported the sky being clear and witnessing auroras.

So south I went. I saw a green light glowing in between the dark clouds after driving south on Highway 1 for an hour. Each time I stopped finding a slight clearance of the sky the cloud came rolling in fast from the north. I was literally racing with the clouds and got few photos while beating the clouds for a moment.

Mist effect coming from the humidity and the snow clouds gave a romantic feeling to the stars and the air feeling very frosty.