The Crown Range was closed by heavy snow for the first time this year as temperatures in parts of the province fell below freezing.
And last night residents in St Clair and St Clair Park reported power cuts in their suburb from about 9.15pm after a day of steady rain and bitterly cold winds in Dunedin.
A spokesman for Delta said last night crews were attending to the problem.
The cause of the outage and the number of homes affected were unclear.
Power was restored at 10.50pm.
Police closed the Crown Range road about 4.30pm yesterday.
About 12 vehicles had ‘‘slid off'' the alpine road and another 20 had been stranded.
Police spokesman Nic Barkley said five vehicles remained on the range overnight but every motorist had been rescued.
The closure came after several drivers ignored warnings about chains being essential for any vehicle crossing the range.
The Queenstown Lakes District Council has advised this morning that the Crown Range is open but chains must be carried.
Crown Range Rd open & heavily gritted; chains to be carried as more snow forecast. Coronet Peak road open & gritted. Wet & windy elsewhere.
— QLDC (@QueenstownLakes) May 22, 2016
The alternative route between Wanaka and Queenstown was via Cromwell on State Highway 6.
Blake and Sara Korteweg, a sharemilking couple from Hedgehope, Southland were among a group of motorists caught in about 5cm of snow on the top of the Crown Range yesterday.
Mrs Korteweg told the ODT the couple, along with daughter Maisie, were driving home from Wanaka in their Holden Commodore car when they were forced to stop at the summit (1121m) about 3.30pm. There were several other cars at the top.
They did not have chains for their car, so waited for the grit truck to arrive and then followed it safely down the other side.
MetService meteorologist Claire Flynn said snow began falling on the Crown Range about 3pm. At the same time, the temperature at Lindis Pass was -0.3degC.
NZSki chief executive Paul Anderson said Coronet Peak and the Remarkables skifields got "a good dump'' of snow yesterday.
Snowmaking began on the trails last week but it was nothing compared to "proper'' snow, Mr Anderson said.
"A natural dump makes a huge difference. It is a substantial fall so we expect it will hang around with some cold temperatures coming over the next few weeks. Getting a top of natural snow is just fantastic.''
Treble Cone reported on its website 5cm of snow fell on the skifield.
On MetService social media, people posted about snow settling to 600m on Queenstown hills, and sleet in Dunedin.
MetService meteorologist Leigh Matheson said between noon and 8pm yesterday, 44mm of rain fell in Waitati, 23mm in Musselburgh, 20mm in Dunedin City and 6mm in Middlemarch.
Ms Flynn said the weather would be "mostly fine'' across Dunedin tomorrow but showers were forecast on Wednesday and Thursday.
