This winter so far has been one of dry fronts for south-eastern Australia, bringing little rain and priming the air for frosty nights to follow.
This week has been no exception.
A front which moved through during Sunday brought light showers and highland snow, but sheltered areas away from the ranges just experienced cold, dry winds.
With a high pressure system moving in rapidly behind, just like one has several times previously this month, nights were chilling as much as five-to-10 degrees below average earlier this week.
Monday night was the coldest night in three years at Bega (-2.2) in and two years in other parts of NSW including Perisher, Wagga Wagga, Orange and Forbes.
Wagga Wagga's minus 3.3 degrees was an 11-year low for the month of June.
Tuesday night was notably milder due to cloud streaming in from the interior, where it has been raining.
Cloud acts like a blanket and helps prevent daytime warmth from escaping during nighttime hours.
Minimum temperatures across NSW were at most three degrees below average on Wednesday morning a were a few degrees warmer than usual for most of the state.
Despite the brief reprieve from frost yesterday, the frigid nights will return at the end of this week.
A front today will be similar to the past few, fairly dry, delivering little in the way of rain and snow.
A high quickly taking over will cause skies to clear and winds to calm, making temperatures drop five-to-10 degrees below average again.
Some places are likely to experience their coldest nights and mornings so far this year, with frost likely to be widespread on and west of the ranges and even a chance in some suburbs of Canberra and Sydney.
Severe frost is likely over some inland areas this weekend.
Heading into next week there are signs of a more typical winter weather pattern developing, with fronts becoming more frequent and bringing more rainfall and snowfalls than recent weeks.
