Friday is a calm day for many North Island areas after a blustery Thursday, with the bulk of the heaviest downpours tracking across parts of the North Island and maybe later into the east of the South Island.

Cook Strait has strong blustery winds, gale in exposed places, but they should ease later on Friday.

By Saturday the low will be tracking east of Coromandel Peninsula and out to the east of East Cape by the end of the day. As it does this a strong, cooler, south to south west flow will cover the North Island’s northern and western areas.

By Sunday the low is out to the east of New Zealand with a fairly typical winter’s day.

Next week starts calm with more westerly quarter winds potentially.