Early bird: Dawn fishing from Devonport wharf this morning. Photo / Michael Craig.
Early bird: Dawn fishing from Devonport wharf this morning. Photo / Michael Craig.
The best beach weather over the weekend and early next week is expected to be on the Coromandel Peninsula and in Hawke's Bay.
While temperatures are forecast to reach 28C in those areas and to 30C in some areas, low cloud and a chance of fog in the mornings is expected to keep the high in Auckland to 21C over the weekend, rising to 22C on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Weatherwatch is predicting some areas may reach "heatwave" status, defined as five degrees or more above normal for at least five days.
Sunday is well above normal nationwide, with about 75 per cent of the country 8C or more above normal for the time of year. The run of summery weather is predicted to continue into the middle of next week.
But Auckland and other western coastal parts of the North Island look like missing out because of breezes coming off the Tasman Sea.
"In Auckland set-ups like this show how the city acts more like an island - which it almost is, with the narrowest part of the city just over 1km wide between the Tasman Sea and the Pacific Ocean," a Weatherwatch forecaster said.
"So when the winds blow straight in from the Tasman Sea some suburbs don't get much warmth with the air not travelling over land to warm up first."
The City of Sails is predicted to reach 18C today, 20C tomorrow and 21C on Monday.
MetService meteorologist Andy Best said while temperatures weren't breaking records, the warm start to November was slightly unusual and was because of the persistent ridge of high pressure over the Tasman.
That mass of hot air is flowing in a south-east direction from Australia, which has had an extremely hot and dry October. Maximum temperatures there were almost 3C above average, making it the second hottest October in records going back to 1910.
The warm air was being steered towards the South Island today while it will make its way north over much of Aotearoa on Sunday and Monday.
The outcome was a rare forecast of dry weather throughout the country today.
Alexandra, in Central Otago, was forecast to reach 30C, while the warm air was expected to heat up areas in the east and north of the country from Sunday, with Masterton, Hastings and Kawerau predicted to also hit 30C.
Coming close will be Rotorua (28C Sunday and Monday), Tauranga (27C Sunday and Monday), Gisborne (27C and 26C) and Hamilton (24C and 26C). The Bay of Islands will reach a high of 23C-24C.
After a sweltering few days across the southeast, a cool change is on the way, bringing showers & isolated thunderstorms.
Wellington will reach 16C today and 20C on Sunday and Monday.
Looking further into the month, there is some welcome warmth in the forecast, but the prevailing northwest winds have a down side; producing an unusually wet month for western areas, especially the West Coast of the South Island.
Frequent northwesterly winds, and unusually warm temperatures nationally, are expected for the first week of November. During the second week, northwesterlies continue, with above-average temperatures continuing for inland and eastern regions of both Islands.
Much of the country will be warmer than usual this month. Source / MetService
A mixture of low pressures and westerly winds is then predicted for the second half of the month, likely producing cooler conditions for much of the South Island.
Overall, November will be warmer than usual for northern and eastern regions.
It will be much wetter than normal for western regions of the country, south of about Waitomo. Rainfall will be close to average for other parts of the country.
