Lake Wakatipu was lapping at the top steps of Earnslaw Park yesterday morning, but by the afternoon water levels had begun to fall.
At mid-afternoon yesterday, Queenstown Lakes harbourmaster Marty Black said everything was looking positive, although the lakes would be monitored.
At 10pm on Sunday, the lake was at 311.038m. This rose to 311.046m at noon yesterday and by 4pm yesterday it was 311.040m, the Otago Regional Council's website reported.
The ''possible flooding'' level is 311.300m but the first alert level is triggered at 310.800m.
Lake Wanaka, too, was dropping.
At 10pm on Sunday, Lake Wanaka was at 278.915m and at 4pm yesterday it had fallen back down to to 278.852m.
The ''possible flooding'' level for Lake Wanaka is 280m.
There had still been a ''buffer'' between lake and land at the peak of both lakes' rise yesterday, Mr Black said.
He urged boat users to be wary of debris but there had been no reported damage and he said: ''We should be right. It will drop quite quickly now.''
The Clutha River at Balclutha hit its first flood warning of 1140cumecs on Friday, peaking at 1325cumecs yesterday morning, well short of the second warning level of 1680cumecs.
