THE WEEK AHEAD – A BRIEF BURST OF HEAT, THEN SOMEWHAT COOLER TO END JULY!

High pressure will gradually move in from the Atlantic as we start the new week, bringing further largely dry conditions, along with another brief surge of heat through Tuesday and into Wednesday.

It doesn't hang around for particularly long though! Cooler Atlantic air will quickly begin to return later on Wednesday, leaving us with a much fresher feel for Thursday and Friday as we see out the final few days of July.

The heat is never particularly far away though, and there are already some hints that high pressure may try to build back across us as we head into the first few days of August. That's still some way off though, and as we all know, the weather has plenty of time to change its mind between now and then!

MONDAY

High pressure will be sitting just to our southwest and gradually nudging its way towards us as we start the new week. There will be a mixture of patchy cloud and sunny spells, and whilst some places may see a little more cloud at times, there will still be plenty of brighter spells in between.

Temperature: 23°C to 25°C

Wind: Moderate WNW at first, becoming WSW and turning fresh and quite gusty during the afternoon.

TUESDAY

High pressure moves across us during Tuesday, although it will already be starting to weaken and gradually wander away towards the east and southeast. Once again we'll see a mixture of sunny spells and areas of cloud, with the cloud perhaps becoming a little more significant for a time during the day.

This is also when we'll start to see another brief push of hotter air moving into our part of the country, although for those who have well and truly had enough of the heat by now, it isn't planning on hanging around for particularly long.

Temperature: Warmer than Monday, with a brief surge of heat developing at 24-26°C

Wind: Light at first, becoming light to moderate SW before gradually turning S to SE later.

WEDNESDAY

Wednesday looks like being the warmest part of this brief spell, with plenty of sunshine across the Island. Despite the warmer air being around us, southwesterly winds will begin to pick up through the day, which should at least take the edge off the temperatures somewhat.

Meanwhile, much cooler Atlantic air will already be knocking on the door from the west, gradually shunting the hotter air away towards eastern and northeastern parts of the UK. So Wednesday looks like being the peak of this little burst of heat before somebody turns the thermostat back down again!

Temperature: 25°C to 27°C but turning cooler from the west-southwest

Wind: Moderate WSW/SW, potentially becoming fresh later in the afternoon.

THURSDAY

And this is where you'll probably notice quite a difference! Low pressure will be sitting to the north and northeast of Scotland, whilst high pressure retreats well out into the Atlantic to the west of Ireland. This opens the door to a much cooler Atlantic airflow across our part of the world.

There will be quite a lot of cloud around at times, along with the possibility of the odd shower or showery patch of rain. The chances aren't particularly high though, and much of anything heading our way may simply run out of enthusiasm before it actually reaches the Island. So whilst there may be the odd bit of rain here and there, unfortunately it doesn't look like anything particularly useful at this stage.

Temperature: 20°C to 23°C

Wind: Moderate to fresh W-SW.

FRIDAY

High pressure will begin trying to nudge back towards us from the Atlantic during Friday, and the temperatures do make a bit of an effort to rise again... but they're not really getting very far! So we look set to see out July on a much cooler note, with temperatures generally back into the low 20s.

Temperature: Low 20s Celsius

Wind: Mainly W.

AND THEN INTO AUGUST...

There are some early indications that high pressure may begin to build more strongly across us again as we head into next weekend and the opening few days of August.

If that happens, warmer — and potentially briefly hot — conditions could make another appearance.

But we're wandering a little way down the forecasting road with that one, so there's plenty of time for things to shuffle around before we get there.

For now, the general theme is fairly straightforward: largely dry conditions continue to start the week, another short-lived burst of heat moves through during Tuesday and Wednesday, and then somebody opens the Atlantic door and lets the cooler air back in for the final couple of days of July.