It’s easy to think the summer weather pattern has arrived – but truth is, it’s only just beginning to arrive and we still have to ‘flush away’ what is left of the spring pattern first.

Today eastern parts of the North Island will hit 30 degrees, while afternoon heat showers pop up again in some inland areas.

Sounds like summer, right? Ok, well here’s the spring reminder:

Christchurch has a high of 25 degrees today – but a high of just 14 degrees on Thursday.

Wellington has “strong” winds back in the forecast, off and on, over the next 10 days.

Greymouth has 5 of the next 10 days with a 60 to 100% chance of rain.

Napier and Hastings have highs around 30 degrees today and tomorrow, also Saturday. Other days it’s closer to 21 to 24.

Auckland, while lovely today and Wednesday, has patchy rain on Thursday then a spring-like front on Saturday will see another burst of rain followed by….hmmm…6 days of windy sou’westers?

Those are just a few centres – there will be some parts of NZ cloudier and wetter and cooler, while other regions (like Bay of Plenty and Northland for example) which may well be two of the more ‘summer-like’ regions.

CHRISTMAS DAY?
We can’t make a specific forecast for the day, but we can see two weather features for us to focus on in that week. 1) It looks a like a large high will be either over New Zealand, or gradually drifting away.  2) There may be a more La-Nina like sub-tropical rain band near eastern Australia and to the tropics direcrtly north of us…perhaps just a matter of time until high pressure leaves New Zealand and the sub-tropical downpours slide in.

One to watch, we’ll keep you posted!

– Image / Monday December 19th, the start of the week before Christmas shows a large high drifting in, but also a fair bit of ‘life’ in the weather pattern north of the country and east of Australia. Is this La Nina finally kicking in a bit more? Image by Weathermap.co.nz

– WeatherWatch.co.nz