Gisborne farms still without power

Some farms in the high country around Gisborne are still without power after heavy snow caused havoc across the eastern North Island last week.

The snow, which closed highways and many high country roads in the area, also caused widespread power outages.

Read Lougher, of Ruatahunga, about 50km inland from Tokomaru Bay, said said it was the heaviest snow he had seen in more than 40 years.

He predicted the snow and ice would remain on the farm for a few more days, but relatively fine weather over the weekend would help.

"The snow is starting to melt and we should have a change to northeasterlies, and that should bring some warm weather to help melt the rest of it. It's probably about two-thirds of the way forward now."

He said the farm had been without power for four days.

"We've got generators for the freezers and we've got fireplaces that we cook on so everybody seems to have managed. We're hoping to get power back on today - the helicopter's on the line at the moment, checking things, so usually when they do a run like that it's getting pretty close to switching things back on."

Mr Lougher said once the snow has melted, work could return to normal.

"The snow and ice is definitely impeding things at the moment, it's turning things to slush and we will have to wait a bit for things to dry out so we don't cause any damage to the road."