This photo is courtesy of http://www.foliagenetwork.com and shows the foliage as of October 6th. For a more updated report, please click here: http://bit.ly/1vNmcwp              

I wish I had a dollar for every email, Tweet or Facebook post I have received asking about this weekend.  There is a LOT going on.

This is a huge weekend for the state’s economy.  People will be off from school and looking for things to do.  It’s a huge wedding weekend (to take advantage of the fall foliage) and of course thousands of runners have been training for the Hartford Marathon.  That’s just a slice of what’s happening.

What can you expect?  As the title above says, rain will be an issue for one slice of the weekend.  For Marathon runners and spectators it looks to fall during Saturday morning.  This is a big weekend for the area wineries as well. The good thing about the wineries is that they can be enjoyed on a sunny or rainy day.

The computer data has been pretty consistent in bringing an area of low pressure by to our south Friday night into Saturday morning.

Forecast details: The two models above (The American Model – GFS (Left), The European Model – ECMWF (Right), show the 18z (early afternoon).  When it comes to the morning, both show a decent amount of rain.  Both show improvements for the second half of the day, but if you have plans in eastern MA or the Cape, expect the tapering of rain to be slow and linger for a good part of the afternoon.  It’s worth noting that the GFS model has the rain exiting a little more quickly.  There is support for this as well from the “ensemble” data, which is data that supports the models above.

The rest of the weekend looks OK.  However, another system will approach from the west and we could see showers by the second half of Columbus Day.

The weekend isn’t perfect, but if I had to choose THE best day, Sunday would be the day. Sunshine with temperatures in the 60s.  Enjoy the long holiday weekend!