Clear skies and balmy weather are promised for New Year’s Eve around most of the country with morning cloud.
Regions in the North Island will have temperatures in the low-to-mid 20s today and New Year’s Day.
Holiday hotspots in the country’s north had blistering temperatures on Friday as temperatures plunged further south following scorching weather there on Thursday.
MetService said settled weather should linger into the weekend with a ridge of high pressure over the country.
Auckland should expect a party cloudy day today with evening showers though. The Super City should hit 26C, dropping to 23C and more cloud on Sunday.
Sunny 25C weather is forecast for Tauranga today and a partly cloudy 22C for New Year’s Day. Rotorua will drop to 22C today and 21C with a partly cloudy day on Sunday.
Scorching heat in parts of the North Island today follows similar weather in the South Island earlier this week, but on Friday temperatures in the south plummeted with Christchurch and Dunedin barely reaching 16C and 15C respectively.
Wellington also languished on 17C with brisk southerlies. The capital should have a fine final day of the year with some showers and cloud expected in the morning, while cloud is forecast for New Year’s Day. Both days should be 18C.
The Garden City should expect fine weather today apart from some morning cloud with a temperature of 19C and a partly cloudy day on Sunday. Evening cloud is forecast for Dunedin tomorrow but should remain fine most of the day at 17C.
Northern parts of the country were sweltering Friday, with some regions hitting 29C by early afternoon.
The Bay of Plenty experienced sizzling temperatures with a high of 30C forecast for Te Puke by about 3pm. Tauranga reached 28C, but MetService says it “felt like” 29C.
Te Puke experienced its third-hottest December temperature since 1973 according to the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (Niwa).
Rotorua sat just below 28C, with fine skies becoming cloudy in the evening. Evening showers were forecast for the Bay of Plenty.
In the Coromandel, the mercury in Whitianga and Thames cracked 28C Friday afternoon. Auckland, meanwhile, lagged behind at 23C at 3pm.
Hastings and Napier recorded their hottest days of the summer ahead of temperatures dropping for the new year.
The mercury reached 28.2C at MetService’s weather station in Hastings about 1.30pm on Friday, which was the hottest temperature at the time in the country.
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