A strong cold front brings a blast of more seasonable air for the mountains with continued cool temperatures but a return to sunshine for the weekend in the valley. The cold front will move across the valley Friday evening accompanied by a burst of rain and some wind.
Colder air settles in behind the front before sunrise Saturday. 1or 2" of snow accumulation is possible in the mountains, less than 1" in McCall, and no accumulation for the valley but black ice could form is some areas before the sun comes up on Saturday.
If you are headed to The Great Idaho Potato Bowl at Albertsons Stadium at 1:30pm it will NOT snow and will actually be bright and sunny with a brisk northwest breeze and temperatures in the upper 30s. It will quite windy in the Magic Valley late tonight into Saturday with gusts up to 45mph and wind chills in the 20s.
Sunshine will be short-lived as another inversion will likely develop by Christmas morning meaning low clouds return each morning with sunshine developing in some areas later in the day.
This time of year it is very difficult to keep sunshine in the valley as the sun is at its lowest angle so daytime heating of the ground is not sufficient enough to warm the air over the valley. This allows moisture to stay trapped in the valley causing low clouds and fog anytime there is not a storm system nearby to stir up the valley air.
Our travel weather for this weekend will be fine westbound with dry conditions on Saturday. There will be some lingering snow showers in the central mountains on Saturday morning but it will be dry into Sunday with valley for returning to some valleys by over the weekend.
