Weather Watch: An Auckland love affair

A beautiful day and sparkling waters are enough to make anyone fall head-over-heels in love with Auckland. File photo / Paul Estcourt

What an absolutely amazing weekend. Sunny weather might not be good for weather blog ratings (we're all outside and not online) but it's certainly great for our health and wellbeing.

I don't know about you but long, sunny, cloudless days make me lazy.

I feel utterly guilty for being inside yet a few steps out in the sun and I start dreaming of a nice glass of Viognier out on my deck followed by a healthy lunch and then an afternoon nap on the bed. Even the animals get it - cats are lazier, dogs look sleepy.

I did a little bit of gardening before thinking... 'meh, this can wait'. Went back inside and lay on the couch for a while instead.

But I wasn't completely lazy...I was woken at 10:30am (correct, 10:30am) on Sunday by a friend wanting to take her dog for a walk with mine (ok, so I was lazy being in bed that late).

We went down to the waterfront and I gotta say as a person who still describes himself as a non-Aucklander despite living here for the past 9 years - I fell in love with Auckland on that walk.

The Waitemata Harbour was like glass...the sky was utterly cloudless. People walked, children played, dogs ran by...and after such a cold winter the sun felt so good. The city centre looked really proud...and scurrying along in the harbour with lots of little boats heading out for a day on the water. I felt very proud of living here.

And I'm sure others around the country felt the same about where they live - as it was a similar story weatherwise across New Zealand. Light winds and clear blue skies. In fact, the southerly flow that died out over the weekend left some pretty cold air behind - it was as icy as far north as Auckland on Sunday morning.

Gisborne and Hawke's Bay weren't so lucky. A rather large low well east of the country fuelled windy, cold and showery weather into their regions.

The good news is that while the rest of New Zealand starts to go downhill this week, you guys will enjoy sunnier, warmer, weather for longer. So it all evens out.

Although many of you will be inside at work....hmm...well, still, at least it'll be sunny on your way to and from work and during your lunch break.

So as I say, the rest of New Zealand will go downhill this week weather-wise...but it's going to be in slow motion. The high that's over the country is a big one...it will only very slowly move out into the Pacific as the week progresses.

In fact the weather this week is going to be completely slow moving. You can see it here with our independent Auckland weather forecasts. The temperatures slowly creep up... the cloud slowly creeps in.

It will take five whole days for the high to move off the country and for the next system to move in.

Behind the high will be a strengthening northerly flow and a little bit of unsettled weather around Friday and Saturday. But long range models are already showing another high possibly moving onto New Zealand this time next week.

I'm still not sure about how much rain the unsettled weather will bring at the end of the week. It has the potential to bring heavy rain to the west... so it's definitely worth keeping an eye on - especially with such a slow moving (and therefore 'blocking') high to the east.

Top: Warm weather and sparkling waters could make anyone fall head-over-heels in love with Auckland. File photo / Paul Estcourt