Gentle bite of late winter cold snap
Wintry weather expected to continue for several days - but conditions are not expected to be as bad as they were in February
Winter has returned to parts of northern France, with snow already falling in parts of Île-de-France, Normandy and Brittany, Météo-France has said.
But this is no repeat of the arctic blast that gripped France in February - though it is unusually late, forecasters said, and has prompted Paris and several other northern regions to activate their Grand Froid plans to help more vulnerable people, such as the homeless.
Météo-France had not issued any orange weather alerts on Sunday morning, though snow was expected across the Grand-Est, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes and Burgundy-Franche-Comté. Several centimetres were forecast on the Jura mountains and northern Alps.
Minimum temperatures will range from -4C to 0C over the north and northeast, and from 1C to 6C elsewhere. The maximums will vary between 1C and 5C over the northeast quarter, 6C and 10C from the Channel to the southwest, and 13C or 14C near the Mediterranean.
It will be uniformly overcast from Hauts-de-France to the Centre, while a few snowfalls will reach the east of Île-de-France and Norman hills, while a light northeasterly wind will make it feel several degrees colder.
Further west, rain is expected from central Brittany to the southwest, notably over the Basque Country. It could turn to snow above 700m in the Pyrenees and the Massif Central, Météo-France said.
The southeast will enjoy much of the best of the weather on Sunday, though more snow could fall at higher altitudes overnight.
The cold spell is set to continue for several days with temperatures forecast to dip as low as -10C in the Massif Central and northeast of the country.
In general, Monday temperatures will be between 5C to 8C lower than average for the time of year across France.
