A large area of low pressure kicks off this week but will be replaced by increasing high pressure for the first week of the school holidays.

While Monday and Tuesday do see a colder SW change sweeping up New Zealand and then a secondary cold surge brushes Southland and Otago around Wednesday most places do see weather conditions settling down this week as high pressure builds.

By Friday and the weekend the high should be over NZ with mainly dry weather and just a couple of coastal showers at the fringes.