It's the middle of winter here in New Zealand and we have just been on two fantastic tours in the South Island. The weather was simply superb and we enjoyed some amazing light.

The first trip was for twelve days and went from Christchurch over to the West Coast, down through Otago and Fiordland, up through Canterbury and back to Christchurch.Our guests were John, a science teacher from the US, and Josh, a professional photographer from Australia. It was both their first visit to New Zealand and they were really looking forward to getting out into the wild. The middle of winter is, in my opinion, the best time for landscape photography in New Zealand. The air is clear,the mountains are covered in snow and the sandflies are almost non-existent.

We started out from Christchurch on a very chilly, but totally calm and clear morning. The first stop was to photograph a landscape of strange rock formations. The snow was thick on the ground which was a great bonus to the scene. The day just got better and better as we travelled and landscapes of snowy mountains with frosty trees in the foreground, sweeping panoramas of the Southern Alps and even a pair of crusty old boots tied on a fence gave us plenty to photograph. By late afternoon we had made our way over to the West Coast and our destination: Punakaiki. After such a beautiful day I thought the light on the Pancake Rocks was going to be sublime, but for some reason there was a band of cloud blocking the sun right where we were. I looked down the coast and there was not a cloud to be seen - I felt like we were being toyed with! Quite often this type of high cloud reduces sundown to a watery event where the light amounts to nothing. Unbelievably, right as the sun was setting it slipped past a tiny gap in the clouds and the last rays of the day brought the rocks to life in a blaze of orange and red. John and Josh were stunned at the colours as they worked quickly to capture the scene. A colourful sunset followed which kept us photographing for some time. Day one had delivered spectacular conditions and light, and we were thrilled to already have a variety of excellent images in the bag.

The next morning we were out early on the rocky coastline photographing the changing light. After breakfast we packed our gear and started the drive south to Fox Glacier. It was another glorious day and we made stops as we went. We arrived at Fox mid-afternoon and it was decided that a helicopter would be chartered for a sunset shoot of Aoraki/Mt Cook and Mt Tasman. After a break at the motel we got all our thermal clothing on and drove down to the chopper pad. Thirty minutes later we were making our way up the Fox Glacier heading for the peaks of the Southern Alps. John and Josh had their doors off and braved a temperature of -14 degrees celcius (try having that cold air blasting at you for an hour). I think it was only the adrenaline which kept them from freezing up. The light on the mountains continued to improve and we timed our run past the faces of Aoraki/Mt Cook and Mt Tasman perfectly to capture the last drops of light. To be up at over 12,500ft photographing the changing hues is a mind-blowing experience and both photographers were left speechless when we touched down back in the village. We then celebrated the sensational shoot over a hearty winter meal.

The following day was the heli-hike on Fox Glacier and there was a good variety of caves, arches and blue ice where the hike followed. Aerial photography can be addictive and this was the case with John and Josh, as after their time on the glacier it was back to the chopper pad for another shoot from the air. This time we concentrated on the ice pinnacles and seracs of the glacier. Flying around this area was like being at a sculptors' exhibition - everywhere you looked were the most exquisite shapes and formations.

Leaving the West Coast we travelled east into Otago and on to Queenstown. The first morning we were out well before dawn driving up to Glenorchy. The weather was being a bit cagey and there was a few drops of light rain around. While we waited for the day to brighten we enjoyed a lazy breakfast at the cafe and warmed ourselves by the cosy logfire. After breakfast it was still drizzling, but we carried on undeterred into the Mt Aspiring National Park. When we arrived, the clouds started to break giving us some wonderful misty mountain scenes. In the afternoon we drove back to Queenstown to catch the last light on the Remarkables, but the mountains were cloud-bound so we had to work for our shots. I said to John and Josh that they had had it so easy up until now that not to just turn up and get the shot was a foreign concept!

Our next location was Milford Sound and once again the weather was superb. The highlight was our morning shoot of Mitre Peak - moody cloud and great reflections gave us superb images. After a breath-taking cruise through the fiord we decided to head straight back to Queenstown to try and get the Remarkables in good light. It was a risk as the weather can change quickly and so we were hoping that no cloud had come in over the mountains by the time we got there. As we approached Queenstown we all started laughing as we saw the clear peaks ahead of us, and our evening shoot of the Remarkables gave us some beautifully-lit images.

The next morning we photographed a colourful sunrise before packing up and driving north to Aoraki/Mt Cook National Park. Recent snowfall was still thick on the ground as we drove and the Mt Cook village seemed like an island in the snow. Again, the weather was stunning and our best shoots were at dawn with clear skies and warm light which lit up the Southern Alps perfectly. It would have been easy to stay at Mt Cook longer but we had one last location to photograph: Kaikoura. It was quite a long drive to get there but what amazing results we got for our troubles. We had two sunrise shoots along the coast, and the first morning started off well with the first rays of light bringing the clouds to life in a wash of colour. After breakfast, John and Josh took a boat trip to look for resident Sperm whales and came back with some great photos of these massive mammals.

We were down to the shoreline again the next morning for our last shoot and, as if to sum up what amazing weather we had enjoyed over the past eleven days, the sunrise was a powerful blaze of reds and yellows. The colours were so incredible that John and Josh were awestruck that such intensity could occur naturally (without the aid of the Saturation slider). It was the perfect way to end what had been a banquet of photography and we were well satisfied as we drove back to Christchurch airport. Thankyou very much to John and Josh for their company and the great time we enjoyed together. They both caught on quickly to my dry sense of humour and so they ganged-up and duped me a couple of times - which kept us trying to outwit each other! Josh put together a slideshow on his home theatre for friends and family and told me: "Had the first big screening yesterday and it went unbelievably well - everyone was totally blown away by the photographs - after it finished (ran for just over 15 minutes with 104 photos) they made me run it again straight away!" John has put a slideshow of some of his favourite images up on YouTube which can be seen here