Roofs were lifted, lines brought down and drivers forced to go the long way round after the Rimutaka Hill Rd closed for several hours over the windy weekend.
Featherston bore the brunt of the northwesterly gales, with the town's fire brigade called out to attend to downed lines and to secure roofs.
Chief fire officer Colin McKenna said a large section of one of the buildings at the Magnificat Community retreat on Cross Creek Rd came loose on Saturday.
"We sorted it as best we could ... The wind was just so bad you could hardly hold yourself up on the roof."
While attending to that, they were called to Fox St, where a power line had come down on a property, and soon after, Hoki Smoke fish'n'chip shop called for help to secure loose roofing iron.
Late Saturday, fire, ambulance and police services were called when a man drove over a downed line on Cross Creek Rd, realised what he had done and stopped. He was stuck in his car until emergency services could move the lines.
Power lines also came down on Underhill Rd and Moroa Rd at the weekend. Rimutaka Hill Rd was closed from midday Saturday, and reopened slightly earlier than expected about 5.30pm. In Masterton, two pieces of iron peeled off the toilet block of the main building at Douglas Park School, and a tree came down to block the road on Bennetts Hill.
Carterton fire chief Wayne Robinson reported two incidents: telephone lines down in Victoria St yesterday morning, while on Saturday night firefighters were called to take down a marquee that was threatening to take flight.
Met Service forecaster Nic Bonnette said norwesterlies at the Rimutaka summit were blowing an average of 93km/h overnight Saturday, with the strongest gust of 172km/h recorded Saturday afternoon.
Castlepoint was gusting up to 130km/h and Masterton also had strong winds, with gusts of up to 81km/h.
Most of Wairarapa recorded small amounts of rain, though there was from 60mm to 70mm in the Tararua Ranges, Angle Knob recorded 162.5mm between midnight Friday and midday yesterday, and 55mm fell in Nireaha, east of Eketahuna.
Ms Bonnette said Wairarapa could expect windy conditions for the next few days, with gale westerlies this afternoon and strong norwesterlies tomorrow, with showers.
"It's typical in spring to have stronger west winds and fronts coming across the country, and just at the moment we're caught in a very strong westerly - we have been for a couple of days and it will persist for a couple more."