It was a rare thing to go anywhere without a brolly this March so it shouldn't come as a surprise to find the days of torrential rain not only left their mark on the landscape but also on long-standing weather records.
The endless days of rain were so bad they have re-written the record books. Auckland had its wettest month, hour and day in March since records began more than half a century ago.
Niwa meteorologist Ben Noll said Auckland recorded its wettest March on record with 269mm falling in the past 30 days - a whopping 315 per cent above normal.
It was the also the third-wettest month ever. The wettest was recorded in July 1998, nearly 20 years ago, when 320mm fell.
"March in Auckland is usually known for some of the year's most excellent weather.
This March is as far from that as you can possibly be as tropical storms brought wet and tumultuous weather to Auckland," he said.
In the space of an hour on March 10, during the so-called Tasman Tempest, a torrential downpour dumped 27.6mm in Auckland - the single wettest hour for the month since records started in 1965.
It also became the city's wettest day and the third-wettest autumn day on record.
Perhaps the most impressive rainfall tally for the month was at Whangaparaoa where the 352mm of rain amounted to nearly five times its normal levels and the wettest March since 1946.
Noll said the Tasman Tempest, which brought days of torrential rain across the upper North Island and widespread flooding to parts of Auckland and Coromandel and led to a major water crisis, had churned slowly across the North Island and dumped enormous amounts of rain.
The tropical weather system inundated the Hunua Ranges in a one-in-100-year deluge when 225mm fell in 12 hours.
"There were incredible statistics from the whole event," said Noll.
Kaitaia also recorded its wettest March hour since records began and New Lynn had around 60mm of rain in the space of two hours, which led to extensive and destructive flash flooding.
Noll said the Coromandel Peninsula also had an exceptionally wet month. Whangamata recorded a whopping 475mm during the five-day Tasman Tempest.
Whitianga recorded 407mm for the whole month, making it the third wettest March on record.