UPDATED 6:45am — It was a windy and wet night overnight with isolated squalls and downpours affecting the upper North Island while colder air moves into the lower North Island.

This generated a few isolated thunderstorms too.

A wind gust of 159km/h was recorded on the hills around Wellington yesterday late afternoon, in the main peak of windy weather.

Today is another windy day but winds turn more west to south west in many places.

The main theme for Wednesday will be lower temperatures across most of NZ.

THE SET UP:

TEMPERATURES:
About 90 to 95% of New Zealand will be below average today temperature-wise as the storm near Stewart Island slowly tracks eastwards, dredging up the cold change.

Single digit highs are likely through some parts of Southland, Otago and Fiordland although it doesn’t look quite as cold as today could have been. Most main centres will make highs into the double digits – but not all may make it to the teens.

Auckland has a high of around 19 or 20 today, about 8 degrees lower than yesterday.

Christchurch has a high of around 18 today, this is about 10+ degrees cooler than yesterday.

SNOW:
More snow on the mountain tops today as the main cold event comes through.

WIND:
More strong winds today with gales through the mountains and gusty weather extending as far north as Auckland.

While winds may still reach severe gale around Cook Strait and the lower Southern Alps/Fiordland, intensity levels are down on yesterday.

RAIN: