The Easter getaway was in full flood with typically grim weather ushering in the bank holiday weekend.

Good Friday is expected to be the busiest travelling day of the holiday period as an estimated 20 million people take to the roads and trains over the Easter break.

Although the wintry conditions that gripped much of Scotland and Northern Ireland for the past few days have moved on, most of the country faces rain over the weekend.

There will be some brief respite on Easter Sunday with sunny spells before more unsettled weather on Monday.

Forecaster Andy Ratcliffe of MeteoGroup, the Press Association's weather division, said: "Conditions will be quite miserable for much of the Easter holiday. Temperatures will be slightly cooler than normal for this time of the year."

A band of rain was moving steadily north east across the country and on Easter Saturday, showers and longer spells of rain are expected across much of England and Wales.

The transport network will bear the brunt of what is typically one of the busiest travel periods of the year and a spokesman for the Highways Agency said they were anticipating that Good Friday morning would be the peak travel period.

The AA estimated 56% of the UK's motorists were likely to take to the roads this Easter. Last Easter, the service attended more than 50,000 breakdowns and bosses are expecting another busy period as many people make their first long-distance car journey of the year.

On the trains, there will be reduced services on both the West and East Coast main lines, with rail-replacement buses in some areas and some First Great Western and South West Trains services are also being disrupted, with buses replacing trains on some routes.

Around two million Britons just can't face more bad weather and will flee to sunnier climes over the Easter weekend. Travel organisation Abta said most would flock to Spain and its islands.