"Red in the morning shepherd's warning, red at night shepherd's delight" is the simple weather forecasting system that I learned from my grandparents. I understand that the colour results from the scattering of light by water vapour and dust particles in the atmosphere, and the prediction works best when the weather comes from the west. I'm not sure if this old saying applies to the northern hemisphere only, but it does seem to have some predictive power here in the southern hemisphere. So - looking across to the Orongorongos from Island Bay this is what I saw this morning:
(Actually to me it looks more orange-y than red - reddish I guess is what I'd call it.)
But it was right...rain today. What a colourful harbinger of grey skies!