Its long been a tradition on this blog to compare the weather between London and Brisbane right in the middle of the Australian winter and, therefore, slap bang at the height of the English summer.
This tradition dates way way back to…….. ahem… last year. Well, my blog is not yet two years old, give me a chance. If I do it two years on the trot, surely I have the right to call it a tradition?
Anyway, although it is a tradition here, I haven’t always got it right.
The first time I did it was in a post where I revealed everything you ever wanted to know about lights, heavies, mids and schooners. I posted it on 7 August last year and I ended it with my London Brisbane mid winter weather comparison.
But August is not the middle of winter here and neither is it the height of summer in England. The middle of July is. So, about now. I realised that when I did my post about the four seasons in Australia in April of this year.
So, what’s the weather like here now and how does it compare with how the weather is back in London. Let’s ask Google….
Whoa! It’s close again! It was very close last year. But for the second year on the trot, London just about wins it. Well done London!
I can actually tell you that where I was in Brisbane, yesterday the temperature peaked at 24° C. It was a glorious day. Obviously I’m back in shorts and T-shirt again. Today, it was a fair bit cooler as the winds change direction and we were hit by the westerlies. Ooooh, dropped as low as 20°C out here in the sticks. Cooler, but still shorts weather.
Taken today at 2.30 PM
It wasn’t a perfect winter’s day though, a menacing cloud hovered nearby…….
But, according to Pete, a seasoned Aussie, the early arrival of the westerlies is good news. They don’t normally hit until August, so as they have arrived ahead of schedule it could be signalling an earlier end to this year’s winter here. They turned up early last year, and by 24th August, (still winter time here) we had temperatures hitting 36°C.
But you may also recall that I went up to Mooloolaba in the middle of July (around the 13th) last year and came back with some fantastic pictures of an Australian winter.
So as you can see, last year was a very short winter indeed, cramming itself in somewhere after the middle of July and ending way before the end of August. And now it looks like this years winter could be ending soon too.
Crikey mate, it’s only just begun!
Hi Sam
Too true, right now here in Queensland we know all about wet! I don’t think there is any doubt that at the moment we are the wettest place on earth, oceans aside.
Manchester gets around 800 mm of rain per year, here in Brisbane over December we got 471 mm. And we got off light compared to the rest of the state. When it is not hot, sunny with clear blue skies it can be very very wet indeed.
haha great post bob. Its funny to think despite Australia being the driest continent it has some of the wettest places on earth (much much wetter than the UK). I went to the tasmanian highlands in the hight of summer and the temp dropped to minus 3C one night and had snow, the other nights just dipped below freezing (which is the norm apparently) and the days topped about 10-13C. Oh and not to mention to constant drizzle the whole time. So i hope people dont think all of Australia is year round fun in the sun, choose wisely lol.
ps. Australia gets more permanent winter snow cover than the uk
Funny co-incidence, I was just thinking yesterday how alike the London and Sydney temperatures were at this time of year.
I have this site on my bloglist as I find it interesting reading another person’s view of Aus life.
Hi Frances
Thanks for popping by and putting me on your bloglist. According to a popular UK tabloid, it’s going to B 34°C in England tomorrow, so if that happens our two countries temperatures won’t be so alike. We’ll see.
For any of my readers interested in the life of an Aussie in Sydney, why not check out Frances’ blog A Lady By The Sea
Cheers
Bob