Planning on traveling up to the Sierra later this week? You better bring along chains.

The National Weather Service is predicting as much as 7 inches of snow could fall at Yosemite National Park and Bass Lake and as much as 4 inches of snow at Huntington Lake through Sunday in Central California’s last storm of 2023.

If you’re heading up to Shaver Lake, it will be mostly rain with a few snowflakes accumulating less than an inch of snow through Sunday, meteorologist Antoinette Serrato said Tuesday morning.

In the Fresno area, light rain is expected starting Wednesday, with more rain arriving Friday and continuing through Sunday, Serrato said. Fresno could get up to a half-inch of rainfall through the weekend, she said.

This week’s rain and snow events are due to an “unsettled pattern” and aren’t a harbinger of heavy rain and snowfall similar to last winter’s deluge, Serrato said.

Cooling Off

The high temperatures Thursday and Friday in Fresno are forecast at 65 and 66 degrees, but then will drop to 60 by the weekend, Serrato said.

In the mountains, snow levels will be at 5,000 to 6,000 feet Wednesday through Thursday but then climb to 6,000 to 7,000 feet Friday through Sunday, she said.