Sunday December 1st is the first day of summer on the meteorological calendar and it kicks off with high pressure affecting much of NZ with a centre forming east of Gisborne and another one moving into Southland briefly. NZ is mainly dry but showers/patches of rain again affect some parts of the top half and central parts of the North Island. Track on MetService rain radar and use WeatherWatch/RuralWeather local hourly rainfall forecasts to make more sense of wet weather chances.

Monday kicks off with high pressure now all centred east of Gisborne, bringing dry weather to most of the country but still a few isolated inland showers in the upper North Island and maybe also the ranges of the lower South Island.

Tuesday has windier spring-like nor’westers returning over the South Island and very lower North Island. Gales around the Southern Alps and rain returns to Fiordland with some showers in Southland.

By Wednesday windy westerlies cover most of NZ with lightest winds in Northland and Auckland. Rain or showers for the West Coast and Southland and dry or mainly dry elsewhere. Hottest in the east.

On Thursday west to sou-west winds cover the nation with a few western and southern showers and that eases by next Friday with high pressure parked over the northern Tasman Sea.

As always drill down deeper with your hyper-local, hourly, 10 day forecasts by downloading the FREE WeatherWatch Alerting App.