Gift wrapping all done, time to wrap up the old year.  Could colder, low-snow-level weather be in our future?  Mug time.

Rain & showers will be around today through early Saturday, along with a notable east wind out of the Columbia Gorge today.  Other than that, rather tranquil wx conditions are in store for the last weekend of 2023.  Fog may be in play, but other than that, expect temperatures to chill down a few degrees from the mild ones we have experienced the past several days.   New Year’s Eve look dry & chilly.  California will dry out, as well, over the later portion of the weekend.  Damaging high surf is coming onshore along the Golden State coastline.  

New Year’s Day: chilly & dry for the entire west coast, excluding San Diego / Baja, where a system will spin cold shower onshore as the Ball drops in New York City.  

The first, short work week of the New Year may present breezy damp conditions for the PNW overnight Tue the 2nd, with additional showers, at times, through the week.  Some model solutions keep the region dry, except for the far NW corner of WA into BC.  As the week nears an end, we do see a colder pattern beginning to develop following a wet Fri Jan 5, as cold air settles over the eastern Pacific, ushering in lowering snow levels by overnight Fri into Sat, Jan 5,6.  The main Low pressure cell will move into CA, leaving the PNW on the cold side of ’the jet’, which means freezing levels could drop well below the passes, as the weekend of Jan 6,7 turns much colder.  We’ll see.

The week of Jan 8-12 has a lot of uncertainty in the model outlook, but the trend is for on & off rain/showers with chilly temps and even the threat for rain/snow mixed down to the surface late week.  COLD Yukon air mass, with High pressure over 1040 mb may begin to influence PNW weather.  However, lots of “debate” between various long-range model solutions - some keep the colder air bottled up well to the NE, others present a more classic Fraser Gap & Columbia Gap outflows of modified Arctic air by Jan 13,14.  Either way, we forecast a colder, damp cycle moving into play as January 2024 unfolds.  Typical PNW winter weather.  (Note: big winter storm may hit much of the eastern half of the country the week of Jan 8-12.)

🎄 Christmas Day 2023

Cup of morn’n coffee in hand, before getting started on a turkey dinner for the holiday.  Thanks for putting up with silly grammar errors, incorrect dates and the informal manner of our forecast discussions; your patience & tolerance is the backbone of this venture.  Sip.

Rain & showers, on & off, are in the forecast through most of this week.   Breaks, if they occur in your location, will be short-lived.  Temps will be a bit warmer than the past several days, with a W-SW component of air flow into the region.  Breezy at times.  

End of 2023.  The coming weekend does look drier, esp by Sunday, although temps will be cooling down notably.  Fog may be in play on New Year’s Day.  Models have not settle down for this period yet, but that is the current trend.  

We may enter a cool, dry spell for several days before rain & Cascade snow return the first weekend of 2024. 

The entire staff here at The Weather Café®️ (me, myself & I) lift our Christmas Mug to you — Merry Christmas 🎁!

Quick shot of rain today, then turning colder for Saturday & Christmas Eve.  Portions of the west side will likely remain in the upper 30s to low 40s on Saturday, given the cold air moving in behind today’s front and an east-northeast offshore breeze.  Valley Fog possible south of Salem, but still chilly.  As mentioned earlier, great Christmas Scarf conditions.  

🎄 CHRISTMAS DAY.  Patrons in Hood River and environs are likely to get a dusting of SNOW at some point before or early Christmas Morning; spots of freezing rain possible in eastern portions of the Columbia River Gorge as the next system Christmas night begins to move onshore. The rest of us could get a shower or two Christmas Day, although most of the steady rainfall should hold off until nightfall, with NW WA & BC, as well as northern CA, will get most of that moderate precipitation; western OR not so much.

Post-Christmas Week:  Definitely a mixed forecast, compared to earlier forecasts of lots of rain along the entire west coast.  El Niño impact is likely to blame, as the strong storms will end up stretched-out along the west coast with the brunt of the precip over California.  Expect a break in the rain Tue into Wed, before the next system - which could be the wettest of the week - arrives overnight Wed Dec 27.  Breezy.  Thursday and Fri are now trending dry, with CA getting set for more rain on Saturday Dec 30.  It will be CHILLY, with increasing east wind by Friday.  Early yet & iffy, but cold air at the surface could bring challenges in regards to freezing temps, if the sky clears Fri night.

🎉 New Year’s Eve.  Not too bad, with a strong storm modeled to arrive on Monday New Year’s Day.  Midnight celebrations are likely to experience a cold east wind before the 1st sunrise of 2024.  Blustery & quite WET on the 1st.  Here’s where model projections look very much like what we saw a week ago for our Christmas weekend — LOTS of wind, COLD rain and mountain snow is charting for New Year’s Day on through the following week.  Will this “disappear” as the dates near ???? - since models have not been too accurate of late. We’ll see.

January 2024 looks to start out wet and cold, with relatively low elevation snowfall - or even some ’sea level snow’.  Unless the El Niño impacts these model prognostications.  

Note: we will grab our Mug Monday and ‘gift’ a Christmas Update.  Ho Ho Ho.

Fairly dry week ahead before plenty of rain arrives.  Mug up time.

A moderately weak Low pressure cell west of the northern CA coast will slowly work its way north, off both the OR & WA coasts today & Tue.  The result will be increasing chance for showers for the west side up into BC, mild temps and clearing, from the south, later on Tue the 19th.  Dry conditions return Wed & Thu.  Fog, too.

Late Thu night Dec 21 a system will move in from the NW.  This one will be supported by cold air aloft, so snowfall can be expected in the mountains (finally) and maybe a dusting in the coast range.  Other than a few showers Fri afternoon, the main impact will be chilly temperatures, with snow east of the Cascades.  Christmas Eve continues to trend DRY and chilly, with a brisk east wind.  A good day to put on that Christmas scarf.

🎄Christmas Day 2023:  The heavy-hitting storm pattern mentioned in our last report is being delayed a few days by the models.  Meaning, the early hours of Christmas will be dry, with increasing clouds and rain as the day unwraps.  The much-weaker-than-expected system, will move in from the west, so it is possible for freezing rain or snowflakes to fall in the eastern portions of the Columbia River Gorge Christmas night into Tue Dec 26.  Breezy west side.  The heavier rainfall will be centered on northern CA Tue.  The PNW will miss the early portion of the heavy rain, as the first half of this stormy period focuses on CA.  

Wed Dec 27 should present a very stormy night, with a Low center pressured storm at 978-982 mb moving northeast up along the coast of OR & WA.   Weather models have struggled with locations, depths, and timing of a series of strong storm centers developing along the battle zone of warm & cold air masses over the Pacific.  Let’s just say that there will be a stormy period during the week following Christmas, with WIND, rain, Cascade snow and chilly temperatures after each storm front.  This pattern is likely to remain in play through the last weekend of 2023 and early 2024.  More on this in our next report, Fri Dec 22.

Interesting that December may end up with a 'wet close', just like November.  

Yeah, ten ’til Christmas.  And, ten days ’til Nature tips the ‘bucket’ over the PNW again.  Let’s take a look ahead, shall we?  ☕️

Overall, the region will be dry through this weekend, Dec 16,17.  Biggest issue will be dense FOG, esp south of Salem and portions around the Puget Sound.  An east wind will kick-up during the weekend, keeping Portland area sunny & bright (although chilly with the wind factor); coastal areas will be absolutely stunning --> sunny & mild.  

Next week will present a few showers around the PNW as a fairly weak storm moves into California, or north along the OR coast.  Our moisture will spin up from the south.  By late Tue, it should dry out again, as the CA storm shifts farther south.  Rain likely in San Diego, late week.  We will continue dry into the big holiday weekend, other than a quick shot of clouds & showers overnight Fri for WA/BC border area.  Sunday, Christmas Eve, is trending dry.

🎄 Christmas Day.  My, oh my, will the wx change quickly.  The dry cycle will turn to heavy rainfall across the PNW as Christmas Day unfolds.  By the evening, heavy rain and blustery winds will dominate the night.  The wx will be audible -> rain on the roof, winds howling.  Buckets of Rain. Tue & Wed Dec 26,27 will be extremely WET & stormy, with the heavy rain expanding from the Bay Area in CA up into Canada.  We may get a tiny, few hour break from the steady rainfall early Wed the 27th, before what could become a MAJOR WIND EVENT Wed night into Thu, along with a return of heavy rainfall.  

For a week now, models have presented a deep Low developing far to the west of northern CA, sweeping NE to the west of OR & WA sometime the 27th-29th.  Latest model solutions continue to indicate a very deep Low (962-965 mb !!) approaching the PNW before ‘filling in’ before landfall well north of Vancouver Island.  Lots of variants to be concerned with here, mainly the track.  The system - should it verify - will be SO LOW in barometric pressure, that the wind field will be large & powerful.  If it remains well off our coast, we’ll be getting wet but not blown away, figuratively speaking; should it track closer Vancouver Is or NW WA, well, it would produce significant, powerful wind gusts.  Too early to formalize a forecast, just a ponder point for now.  We have a week or so for the computers to nail this down.  Be aware for now.

Either way, RAIN will continue ‘by the bucket’ around the PNW through the week after Christmas.  Oh, and it will turn much colder, as well.  The air mass modeled to set-up over the Gulf of Alaska could be the coldest of the season, ushering in low elevation snows around the PNW & northern CA.  New Year’s Eve could be interesting.

Repeat:  “A guy whose troubles are all behind him is probably a school bus driver.”