A bank holiday weekend that is seen as heralding the arrival of spring produced a “white Easter” thought to have been the coldest for a decade.

Any hope of the glorious sunshine of last Easter, when temperatures reached 21C (71F), disappeared yesterday in snow, sleet and strong winds. Snowball fights replaced Easter-egg hunts and trips to the garden centre as snow settled over many parts of northern England and Scotland.

Temperatures were between 4C and 7C yesterday, compared with the seasonal average of 7C to 11C. At Carterhouse, in the Scottish Borders, 3cm of snow was recorded. Gusts of 60mph (97kmh) hit the south Devon coast over the weekend, with winds reaching 40-50mph more generally across Britain.

The weather is forecast to warm up from today with sunny spells predicted — just as much of the country prepares to return to work.

However, cloudy and damp conditions will persist while further sleet and snow showers are expected for some regions. Forecasters have said that the potential remains today for heavy snowfalls in Scotland and eastern England.

Wintry showers began to spread southwards from Scotland and northeastern England in the early hours of yesterday morning. By 5am, snow was falling across northeast England, Yorkshire and Manchester, and had made its way down through the Midlands and East Anglia. Light snow was also seen in London and parts of the South East.

Motorists struggled with the frosty conditions over the weekend, with a number of road accidents reported. North Yorkshire Police described the driving conditions yesterday as “horrendous”, and Durham Police said that the A66 trans-Pennine route was closed for the second night running because of heavy snow.

The misery was compounded on the railways, as Network Rail planned 30 engineering projects over the four-day break, leading to cancellations and delays. More than two million passengers face problems as they try to get home today.

This year’s early Easter has meant that many children will return to school tomorrow. The RAC said that the knock-on effect for road users would be vast numbers of families clogging the busiest routes today for their journey home.

The record books show that a white Easter is more likely than a white Christmas. Over the past 50 years, snow has fallen on a dozen Easters, most recently in 1998, when much of North Wales was brought to a standstill by more than a foot of snow. At this time of year the seas are close to their coldest, after losing their heat over the winter. This Easter, air from deep inside the Arctic Circle swept down over hundreds of miles of cold seas, keeping the winds biting cold and full of moisture, before bursting into heavy snow showers. One saving grace is that the lengthening days and strengthening sunlight mean that the land is warming up, and snow tends to melt quickly.

March is notorious for wild mood swings. The end of the month is when cold outbreaks are feared most and folklore tells the story of the borrowed days, when March took its last three days from stormy April: “The first is frost, the second snow, and the third is cold as it can blow”. This was also called blackthorn winter, when blackthorn bushes came into blossom during a warm spell mid-month only to be dashed by a cold, frosty spell later.

The bookmaker William Hill said that it would be paying £10,000-plus to people who had bet on a white Easter in London.