KEY POINTS:
There are two events this week that will send Kiwis outdoors - Guy Fawkes and the New Zealand Election. In Wednesday's blog I'll look into the weather on election day and tell you how it could affect which party will win. But today I'll focus on the working week ahead and how that will affect your Guy Fawkes celebrations.
Monday will be mostly settled across New Zealand - particularly Auckland and the rest of northern New Zealand. But a deep low is developing just south of New Zealand - in fact it's a nasty one and we should be thankful that it's not going to be making a direct hit - but the fact that it is so nasty means it will affect all of us.
This will start during Monday in the South Island, you'll feel those nor'westers kicking back into gear as the day progresses. During Tuesday they'll build right across the country with gales returning to exposed parts of Southland, Otago, Canterbury, Marlborough and then into Wellington and Wairarapa. Warm to hot nor'westers will fan temperatures back into the mid to upper 20s for some regions but make the most of that warmth - a cold snap is on the way yet again.
Spring has definitely woken up after sleeping in for several weeks! It's a bit like Groundhog Day at the moment with each spring storm seeming to be a carbon copy. That cold snap may deliver single digit highs for Southland and Otago from Wednesday through to Friday - it'll be cold enough to bring snow to relatively low levels and hail to sea level. But, like the last cold snap, it wont be a nationwide event. Most places north of Wellington will just have winds from the westerly quarter with rain or shower activity on Wednesday. Hawkes Bay should be warm and sunny for much of the week.
It's usually about this time of year that some of these eastern places like Napier, Gisborne, Christchurch, Timaru or Dunedin hit 30 degrees during spring storms like this.
So Guy Fawkes - which is on Wednesday - looks as though it maybe a windy one. Wellington, which I think has the best (or at least one of the best) public fireworks displays in the country maybe knocked around by severe gales on Tuesday but at the time of writing this those gales were looking likely to ease during Wednesday - so fingers crossed. In a nutshell, Guy Fawkes looks windy and showery for much of the country - especially Southland and Wellington - but hopefully conditions will start to improve by evening. We'll have a detailed Guy Fawkes forecast on Wednesday morning at Weather Watch Centre.
By Thursday it may still be quite windy across New Zealand but Friday is looking relatively calmer nationwide. The next system may be a Tasman Sea low - that usually means northern New Zealand could get most of the action - and that appears to be either on Sunday or Monday.
By the way - I'm always interested to hear from those of you that have your own weather stations. If you have one, or even just a thermometer outside, drop me a line if you have some interesting stats. Don't worry - I don't mind that they aren't "official". Always good to hear what the weather is like where you live - and not what it's like inside a white weather station out in a field at your nearest airport!
Philip Duncan
Photo / Laurene Boyd
For the latest weather news keep up to date with The Radio Network's new Weather Watch Centre or the NZ Herald weather section.
