The region might be familiar with long, hot days at this time of year, but this summer heatwaves were common and so too were bushfires.

Nationally, it was the warmest summer on record.

Batemans Bay had the hottest mean temperature for our region at 28.2 degrees which was above the long-term usual for the season of 26.1.

Mean minimum temperatures were also warmer than usual at 16.7 degrees, a little above the usual of 15.8.

Nowra also had a warmer than usual average temperature during summer of 28.1 degrees, which was just above the mean of 27.8.

While in Bega, 27.4 was the mean maximum during summer, coming in just above the long-term average of 27.0.

Kiama had the coolest mean maximum of the four locations at 25.1 degrees, which was slightly cooler than the usual of 25.3.

Summer also brought well below average rainfall for Kiama and Nowra.

Kiama received 212.4 millimetres which is well below the season's average of 319.1mm, while 197.8mm of rain fell in Nowra - well below the average of 268.2mm.

Bega, however, received above average rainfall during summer with a total of 294.0mm falling during the three-month period, well above the average of 250.5mm.

Meanwhile, the entire south-east region remains impacted by the long-running drought.

Currently, 15.6 per cent of the area is in intense drought, 60.0 per cent is in drought, and 24.4 per cent is drought affected.

Bureau of Meteorology climatologist Dr Lynette Bettio said the heatwave events during December and January played a major role in the recent summer being Australia's warmest on record.

"The heat we saw this summer was unprecedented. While the final numbers are yet to be analysed, we know it will be the warmest on record for Australia as a whole, and many individual locations will have broken summer heat records as well," she said.

"There was a noticeable absence of strong cold fronts that would normally bring relief during summer.

"A lot of this was caused by persistent high pressure systems sitting over the Tasman Sea that was blocking those fronts from impacting the south of the country, especially during January.

"Rainfall was also well below average for many places."