It's not often you get the chance to head half way up the tallest mountain in New Zealand, and treat yourself to some of the most stunning views this country has to offer. So we took that chance, which almost ended with us not coming home. So this image sits humbly in my memories as a beautiful evening, mixed with a touch of horror.

Horror? Well kinda, a storm cell blew up the mountain early the next morning. Our helicopter attempted to collect us, but turned back quickly. The flight out was cancelled. Next weather window was 2 days away, which was fine with our food supplies, but keeping warm and optimistic was the challenge ahead. What was I going to tell the boss?

After a few hours of chilling, literally, we heard another chopper amongst the howling wind. Note there's no double glazing or heaters in this hut and was -6º inside. The chopper appeared over the crest overlooking Hochstetter Glacier, will this be our saviour?

The pilot hovered 100m away from the hut, swaying side to side in the wind, then rapidly descended to the landing area and settled. A few muffled screams from the pilot ordering us to get in. Oh yes, we were on our way. Once in and buckled up, the pilot warned that the winds had climbed over 40 knots, so will be a bumpy ride back. That didn't bother us, I'd rather die in a chopper crash than freeze to death. But this was no ordinary pilot, but a legend who'd flown countless hours rescuing people in the Himalayas and around the world. We couldn't thank him enough.

We returned back to stable ground, with wobbly knees, it was as peaceful as it could be. I have a video of the flight back if you'd like to see it?

This image shows the Milky Way arching from Malte Brun all the way over to Mount Cook on the right above Plateau Hut. The colourful sky is from what we call Airglow, a faint emission of light by a planetary atmosphere – illuminated gases and it has no relationship with Earth's magnetism and sun spot activity.