Gorgeous Vermont Weekend Underway; Weird Brief Hot Blast Coming; Severe Storms?

Bright pink lilies enjoy the morning sun this morning
in St. Albans, Vermont. The entire weekend is 
set to be sunny and warm. 

The weather in Vermont knows are schedule for now.  We want nice weekends in the summer and now we've got one on our hands.  

We've actually had a fair number of nice weekend days this summer, so we should be pretty happy with this summer.

This weekend still looks like the best one of the summer. Comfortable enough for vigorous activities like hiking to the summit of Camels Hump. 

Warm enough to jump off the rocks at a swimming hole and plunge into the refreshing, hopefully clean water.  Or, pleasant enough to weed the garden, or fall asleep in the hammock after reading a great novel. 

It's weekend weather endorsed by the Vermont Department of Tourism and Marketing. 

Today, we're off to a terrific start. As dawn broke this morning, temperatures statewide were in the comfortable 50s, with some low 60s right near Lake Champlain. The strong July sun will get us up to 80 degrees or so this afternoon. We'll see some wildfire smoke in the air, but it shouldn't get so thick to make us choke or worry too much about air quality. 

Humidity is often high in mid-July. Not today, or tomorrow. After the sun sets tonight, the temperature will crash down into the 50s again overnight. Except near 60 again near Lake Champlain. 

Sunday will be another winner. The only difference between today and tomorrow is Sunday will be a bit warmer, with highs in the low to mid 80s. The sun will still shine, the humidity will stay low, and a little wildfire smoke will probably linger in the air. 

After The Weekend

After our stellar weekend, the weather will turn interesting during the week, following the general pattern we've seen this summer. 

As mentioned yesterday, a big heat dome is becoming established over the Rockies and northern Plains. There could well be some all-time record high temperatures in Montana, North Dakota and in Canada, parts of southern Alberta and Saskatchewan.  

A renegade piece of that heat is set to escape from the Rocky Mountains, race east over southern Canada and blast down on us by Tuesday. 

We'll start to feel the heat Monday as highs get into the upper 80s. By Tuesday, the brief packet of heat should be here in New England. In Vermont, most of us should be in the 90s again, with the risk of some mid or even upper 90s in the hottest valleys. 

It will turn more humid, but not as steamy as it could possibly get. The air is coming from the dry West, after all. So we won't get the full tropical blast. 

Then things could get really interesting Tuesday night. A cold front will be approaching from Quebec. NOAA's Storm Prediction Center has already flagged the risk of severe weather in northern New England later Tuesday or Tuesday night.  It's unusual for New England, at least, for NOAA to sniff this type of thing out days in advance.

It's not definite yet, it's possible nothing will happen. But some forecasters are already throwing around the words "supercell" or "derecho."

We'll keep an eye on this one as get closer to the event. 

Meanwhile, forget about all that. Enjoy this  gorgeous weekend.