Hurricanes captain and All Blacks centre Conrad Smith says that he is recovering well from his eye injury but is relieved to have sorted out the problem.

Smith has surgery on his injured eye which has effectively ruled him out of the first two weeks at least of the new Four Nation Rugby Championship.

Smith did not hesitate in getting his eye checked when the problem first arose and was promptly told that he needed surgery.

The Hurricanes captain says that he is still on track to miss the first two Rugby Championship matches but said that had he waited it would have been worse.

"Eventually if I'd left it, the vision would've deteriorated but at the time it wasn't that bad, and it was lucky in the end that I sort of went in when I did."

Smith had surgery last week on the eye but revealed that he has already played some golf since the operation.

"I can drive around and things, " he told NewstalkZB

"It's still a bit cloudy just in the left eye but I can hit a golf ball and try, and run around and things so it's not too bad."

"I'm back running around as of Monday, just light jogging and sitting on the bike and things, so it's all getting better from now hopefully."

Smith said that "at this stage" the plan is still to sit out of the Bledisloe Cup games against Australia and hopefully return for the test against Argentina on September 8 in Wellington.

"I know in probably a week or two I'm going to be feeling great and wanting to play, but I've just got to keep going back [to his specialist]," he told Fairfax.

Smith said that he still didn't know what caused the injury but has backed Ma'a Nonu to keep his No 13 jersey warm.

"Ma'a's spent a lot of time in that position over his career so if it is him that's selected there, I'm sure he'll make a great fist of it."