This morning’s hot and dry northeasterly winds would give Otago a nice, warm start, Metservice meteorologist Ngaire Wotherspoon said.
But the weather was due to dramatically change when a cold southwesterly front made its way up the South Island.
She said the cold turn should not last long and would clear up by tomorrow evening.
The rain was going to be a bit "on and off" through the day, but would hopefully be gone by the time the Black Caps took on Pakistan at the University Oval, in Dunedin, at 2.15pm, Ms Wotherspoon said.
"Probably worth bringing a jacket, but hopefully shouldn’t be too bad," she said.
Tonight’s cold change is set to come after a spectacular weekend across the region — the hot spot in Otago, Alexandra, got up to 29.8°C yesterday.
Dunedin reached 22.2°C and Invercargill, Queenstown and Oamaru also had warm weather, with highs of more than 20°C, Ms Wotherspoon said.
She said both Alexandra and Dunedin were expected drop by about 10°C tonight as severe weather made its way up the South Island.
There was a a strong wind watch out for all of Otago from 3am to 9pm today, when the cold front was expected to be coming through, Ms Wotherspoon said.
There would be heavy rain in Otago and heavy rain warnings had already been issued for Southland.
Ms Wotherspoon said the good news was the rain would begin clearing up as soon as tomorrow morning and the weather would continue clearing up for the rest of the week.
"It’ll be a shift to cooler temperatures for the next couple of days and then probably slowly creep up in temperature over the week."
