Sunshine continues for Easter Monday

The UK is enjoying a sunny Easter Monday, with the dry, bright and warm conditions which have marked a glorious bank holiday weekend continuing.

The Met Office said it was set to be warm once again, with temperatures peaking in the mid 20s, though the sunshine will be hazy across southern England and Wales.

The odd sharp shower may develop in the South West later.

It comes after Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland each enjoyed their warmest Easter Sunday on record, the Met Office said.

Temperatures reached 23.4C at both Cardiff’s Bute Park, in Wales, and at Scotland’s Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, while 21C was recorded at Helen’s Bay in Northern Ireland.

These beat the temperatures of 21.6C in Brynamman, Wales, in 1984, along with 20.7C in Aboyne, Scotland, in 2015, and 19.4C in Armagh in Northern Ireland dating back to 1924, which were the warmest Easter Sundays for those countries.

The highest temperature of this bright, sunny and dry Easter Sunday in England was the 24.6C which was reached at Heathrow.

This was still shy of the top Easter Sunday temperature from 2011 when the mercury reached 25.3C in the Solent.

Met Office forecaster Marco Petagna suggested that temperatures could reach a high of 25C or 26C on Monday.

He said: “We have got high pressure moving at the moment giving most of the UK a lot of fine weather, this combined with the fact that the high pressure has dominated for the past few days is allowing the temperatures to heat and build.”

The UK’s warmest Easter temperature was the 29.4C recorded at Camden Square in London on Easter Saturday in 1949.

The other warmest Easter weekend days include the 26.9C recorded at London’s St James’s Park on Good Friday in 2011 – when the mercury also reached 25.3C on Easter Sunday and 24C on Easter Monday, both in the Solent.