A sunny weekend blossoms, but keep a brolly handy

The good news this bank holiday weekend is that there will be an opportunity to don shorts and shades on Sunday as forecasters are predicting the highest temperatures of the year so far. The bad news is that by Monday it's back to wellies and umbrellas as thunderstorms and showers are heading our way. Saturday will be a mix and match of sunshine and scattered showers in England and Wales with the mercury mostly hovering in the high teens. There will be more persistent rain further north, with Scotland seeing temperatures of about 16C. London looks on course to buck the cool trend with temperatures expected to reach 2C.

"Sunday is likely to see the best of the sunshine, with highs of 23C around London and up to 20C elsewhere," said Tiffany Curnick from the MeteoGroup. "There should be good weather across the country and it will be mostly dry."

On Monday the weather will be unsettled with some heavy rain spreading across the UK and possible thunderstorms in eastern England, but there will still be temperatures of 20-2C in the south. The decent weather is good news for those spending the holiday at home but is also likely to lead to more congestion on the roads. Today is set to be the busiest getaway day – both on the roads and at air and sea ports. According to the AA road journey times could increase by 50 per cent with traffic building up from lunchtime. Rail travellers will find the usual replacement buses on Sunday when no less than 38 separate engineering work projects are taking place.