Open the windows, break out the sunblock and make a beeline outside: Sunshine has returned to Portland.
There's plenty of sun in our seven-day forecast, and temperatures are expected to top out near 90 on Tuesday. More welcome news to some, however, is the absence of any precipitation.
If the forecast holds, the seven days beginning Thursday would mark the first week-long stretch Portland has seen without precipitation since mid-September 2016, said National Weather Service meteorologist Shawn Weagle.
Forecasters predict a Thursday high near 68, Friday and Saturday highs in the 70s, and 80s the next two days.
The warm temps won't be isolated in the Portland area, either. Weagle said a high-pressure system sprawling across the Northwest and into Canada will bring a region-wide warm spell next week.
"It's definitely going to feel like summer for a couple days there," he said.
Perhaps even more so, considering Portland's especially wet water year so far. The stretch between Oct. 1, 2016, and Tuesday was the second wettest in Portland history, Weagle said.
He said 47.76 inches of precipitation was recorded at Portland International Airport during that stretch -- falling slightly short of the 48.51 inches recorded at the airport between Oct. 1, 1996 and May 16 of the next year.
The rising temperatures and dry days come on the heels of a springtime snow shellacking on Mount Hood. Timberline Ski Area reports 19 inches of new snow in the past 72 hours, as of Thursday morning. And farther south in the Cascades, Mt. Bachelor reports seven inches over the past three days near the top of its Sunrise Express chairlift.
Warmer temperatures will increase Cascades snowmelt, Weagle said. He said Wednesday night that no northwest Oregon or southwest Washington rivers were forecast to get to flood stage in the next seven days, however.
A more pressing concern, he said, is the appeal of cold waters on warm spring days. River temperatures are still in the 40s and 50s -- temperatures that can quickly bring hypothermia, he said.
"Resist that temptation to get in the water," he said.
-- Jim Ryan
jryan@oregonian.com
503-221-8005; @Jimryan015