It was a wet weekend for many, and there's more to come this week, but a Waihi Beach couple are just happy they still have a roof after a mini tornado ripped by on Sunday.

Ron Grant was asleep when his wife, Glennis, awoke abruptly at 2am.

"It sounded like a train thundering along," Mr Grant said. "This huge roar of wind went between our property and the next door neighbour. I thought the house was going to go."

It lasted only 20 seconds. He described the event as a "mini tornado" moving southwest across their Seaforth Rd property.

"There was crashing and banging, which sounded like windows being broken, but in fact it was debris from the house next door hitting our house and damaging it. One of the downpipes was ripped right off. We have a big retaining wall along the back of our property and a wooden fence above it and it simply took the whole fence, the retaining wall and everything."

Metservice spokesman Daniel Corbett said the slow-moving weather system that had been producing persistent, sometimes heavy rain across parts of New Zealand was expected to ease this week.

Hamilton is forecast to have a bumpy week of showers and rain that will ease on Friday before the rain descends again for the weekend.

The weather system has also dumped fresh snow on Whakapapa and Turoa skifields. River levels rose too.

Hamilton City Council closed all gates to river pathways yesterday due to high water levels.

Waikato Regional Council also issued a flood warning for the Waipa River.

matt.bowen@waikatotimes.co.nz

- © Fairfax NZ News

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