Vermont's Week Ahead: Staying Mild, Remarkably Frost-Free, But A Little Drama Next Weekend

This past week's weather has been remarkably steady state in Vermont. 

It's been so warm and frost-free in Vermont that this
photo taken from a Richmond hillside shows a 
fair amount of green remaining in the trees. Really
late in the season for that. 

Without fail, each day was partly too mostly cloudy, with a few scattered annoying sprinkles and light showers. Each day will get into the 50s to around 60, each night would drop into the upper 30s and 40s.

So much for that trope about just waiting a minute in Vermont and the weather will change. 

This week is looking a little more changeable, but that's not saying much. There will be no dizzying weather whiplashes for the next few days. 

Except this: Shockingly for so late in the season, we're still not seeing sign of a first frost. For many areas away from Lake Champlain, including such places as Island Pond, St. Johnsbury, Springfield and numerous towns around central Vermont  look like they will experience their latest first frost of the season since at least 1970.

For today through the end of the week,, if you want to pick your least favorite day, it was probably today. 

Clouds today were  even more stubborn than they've been lately. That held temperatures down in the low 50s for highs. A few ridge line towns stayed in the 40s, probably. And those annoying light showers continued here and there. A little semi-cold front from Canada was increasing the showers in the north late this afternoon and evening. 

Those showers won't amount to much, maybe a tenth of an inch of rain or less. But they will be just enough to make outdoor activities iffy and sometimes bothersome. 

Although you can still get brilliant blue sky days this time of year in Vermont, it's getting harder to do so. We're heading full steam toward November, which is the cloudiest month of the year.  Which means the rest of the week might not always be bright and beautiful. But it will still be awfully nice for the third week in October.

We actually have a bit of a warming trend setting in.  It won't get ridiculous, like those all-time record highs at the beginning of this month. 

Monday will still be pretty cloudy with a risk of light showers, but temperatures will bump up a couple degrees. Tuesday looks OK, too with afternoon readings bouncing back into the upper 50s. 

Wednesday and Thursday at this point are looking a bit sunnier, and warmer, as highs pop back up into the 60s. That's actually solidly milder than normal for this time of year. 

Foliage is very late turning toward peak in the Champlain Valley and warmer valleys of southern Vermont. So you might be able to enjoy some late season leaf peeping this upcoming mild week. The colors seem like they might end up being a bit more vibrant than they were this year in central and northern Vermont away from the lake. 

There's a lot of question marks for next weekend. Some sort of storminess seems to want to head our way, but it's too soon to get any agreement on what might happen and when. 

Just plan on the risk of rain  next weekend just in case.

Long range models are tentatively backing off on the idea of the first wintry blast of the season at the very end of the month.  Not sure yet, but the trends are toward more sort of average weather to close the month.