A cold and dry week ahead.

Thanks to Tracy for the photograph.

Still some snow showers around in the early part of this evening, but these will swiftly clear west to leave a cold and fairly cloudy night – but likely enough clear spells for a frost and some ice. Down to around -1’C.

So the general picture for Tuesday, and all week is high pressure centred over Scotland with a cold easterly wind.

Some cloud at first but this will break up to leave long spells of sunshine. Cold, with a cold wind, 3’C at best. Clear skies overnight, down to around -2’C, give or take, frosty.

Wednesday also sees long spells of sunshine. A bit of cloud but mostly sunny. Temperatures up to 4’C, but still a cold breeze. Mostly clear skies overnight though a bit more cloud later. Frosty, down to around -2’C.

The breeze turns more north-easterly on Thursday which will spread cloud down. Perhaps sunny to start, but once the cloud arrives – it will just be cloudy. A bit less cold, 5’C, maybe 6’C. Remaining cloudy overnight, around 4’C.

Friday remains mostly cloudy, though maybe a little occasional sunshine. Around 6’C. Likely mostly cloudy overnight, though a few clear spells. Roughly around 1’C – though a chance of a frost if cloud clears sufficiently.

A bit more uncertainty over cloud amounts for Saturday but more likely on the cloudier side of the scale, though with some sunny spells. Perhaps some patchy light rain or drizzle also. Around 5’C or so.

By Sunday, our high pressure moves west/north-west.

This allows two things to happen – colder Arctic air to try to push down from the north, but also low pressure systems to push up from the south-west.

For Sunday itself, conditions will remain broadly unchanged – some cloud, some sunshine and around 6’C – a small chance of some patchy light/moderate rain.

After that is where things become more interesting and much more uncertain.

Broadly speaking there are 3 different possible outcomes for next week, but we could get a combination of them over the course of next week, as opposed to just one clear outcome.

Outcome 1 sees Arctic air sweep south – cold, likely sunny by day, sharp overnight frosts – snow showers possible.

Outcome 2 sees low pressure push up from the south-west, bringing somewhat milder weather, but also rain – probably preceded by a spell of snow.

Outcome 3 sees both the Arctic air push south but also low pressure move north, and we meet in a battle ground scenario with heavy snow.

I’d currently favour either outcome 1, or a mixture of outcomes 1 and 3 – however, a mixture of outcome 1 and outcome 2 isn’t much further behind in terms of likelihood.

The week after next, is arguably more likely back to mild with at least some rain – though cold and wintry weather could very easily return towards the end of January and into February, at least at times.