Hawke’s Bay gets a wet start to the school holidays

Ruby Smith (left), eight, of Ōtāne with sister Indie, five, prepared for the start of the bad weather on Sunday at the Hastings Sports Park. Photo / Connull Lang

Time to bring out the board games - it’s looking like most of this week’s weather in Hawke’s Bay will be rather wet, just in time for the school holidays.

While the bulk of the bad weather around the country in the past few days has been further north and south, a rather temperamental system will still see rain for much of Hawke’s Bay that’s likely to stick around until at least Wednesday.

“It’s going to be a wet couple of days for Hawke’s Bay,” MetService meteorologist Ngaire Wotherspoon said.

“It’s not about to get lovely and sunny. You’ll be getting some more showers on Tuesday; possibly also heavy [rainfall].”

The highest rainfalls over the weekend were in the Hawke’s Bay mountain ranges, with an average of 30-40 millimetres recorded.

“There haven’t been any really big numbers yet. It’s taken a while for the front to sweep up the country, so the big numbers we’ve got now are in places like the Bay of Plenty.”

Wotherspoon said a low front that had swept through the region meant less of the muggy temperatures seen last week, with estimates staying in the mid-teens throughout this week.

“They will be about average for this time of year.”

She said the weather could change depending on what the system does as it crosses over the country.

“[The system] is turning into a complex low, and there’s quite a lot of variation as to how it will behave.”

While no weather warning had been issued for Hawke’s Bay on Sunday morning, MetService advised people to keep up to date with the latest forecasts.

While its likely going to be indoor activities only for kids at the start of these school holidays, a welcome halt on the weather meant that Hastings Blossom Parade was able to go ahead without rain.

Hundreds of tamariki and their whānau turned up to make the most of all the free events happening in the Hastings CBD.