Snow fell intermittently from early Saturday afternoon before settling in around 4pm, delivering 30cm to 45cm of snow to the Coronet Peak and The Remarkables skifields.
However, the snow and accompanying winds disrupted several international flights, with Queenstown Airport processing several departing international services yesterday - one flight to Melbourne, two to Sydney and three to Brisbane.
A Qantas spokeswoman said two transtasman flights were badly affected, being unable to land at Queenstown and eventually ending up in Auckland for the night, after first landing at Christchurch.
Both flights landed in Queenstown yesterday afternoon.
A Jetstar spokesman said the last domestic service of the day, from Auckland to Queenstown, had to return to Auckland as a result of the weather.
Queenstown Airport Air New Zealand manager David Whitaker said some of Air New Zealand's ATR planes had been affected, but its other services "managed to come and go" due to its Required Navigation Performance technology.
• In the Wanaka area, Saturday's snowfall brought 15cm of new snow to Cardrona Alpine Resort and Treble Cone, causing difficult conditions for skiing competitions on Saturday but providing excellent powder conditions yesterday.
The fresh snow and cold conditions were welcomed by skifields, because heavy rain last Monday had caused issues with snow melt.
Treble Cone carried out avalanche control work in the Saddle Basin yesterday morning.
General winter motoring conditions apply in Central Otago and the Queenstown Lakes districts, meaning chains must be carried on alpine passes, including the Crown Range pass.
The New Zealand Transport Agency was warning yesterday of the possibility of black ice on roads overnight and early this morning.
• After almost eight weeks of frozen snow on the ground in Naseby and Oturehua, it finally thawed last week - just in time for another fall.
Naseby had about 10cm-12cm of snow lying yesterday, Oturehua had a 6cm-8cm carpet and Becks and Lauder received a good coating.
"We'd only just got rid of the last lot. It thawed last week after the last round of snow about eight or nine weeks ago," said Tash Kane, of Oturehua.
Naseby resident Eric Swinbourn said it snowed overnight on Saturday and was snowing again yesterday afternoon.
"The frozen snow from the last snowfall had been disappearing for a few weeks so the thaw was definitely on," he said.
With the warmer temperatures in recent weeks, he doubted the latest lot of snow would "stay around".
The snow caused few problems for motorists in the district with the roads remaining clear.
• On the east coast, motorists were warned on Saturday and early yesterday of surface flooding between Timaru and Waianakarua along State Highway 1 and on some other roads after patches of heavy rain, although all were passable.
The Lindis Pass was closed on Saturday night, reopening about 11.30am yesterday.
Inland, Omarama had no snow and Ohau and Twizel had light dustings.
Lake Tekapo fared worst, with white-out conditions most of yesterday.
