Foreign Perspectives

Archive for the ‘Geographic Differences’ Category

Normally it gets seriously cold here in February and even then it’s not every day but recently it’s been absolutely freezing for days at a stretch.

It’s actually so cold at the moment that snow has been spotted about 30 minutes along the road to our west which is much earlier than it would normally be there. OK, not a whole lot of snow but even so.

But it’s the wind that’s really getting to us. For several days now it’s been blowing something of a gale. If you were to throw some snow into that equation, we’d be in big trouble I suspect. As it is, it’s darned cold here in the office where I normally type this stuff (no heating as it shouldn’t really be required in here).

I think we’re in for a darned cold Winter!

Ordinarily, we can see Queribus no problem but for the last few days it’s been almost entirely shrouded in mist.

That’s messed up the walking season somewhat to put it mildly. Typically, walkers start with us and set off for Carcassonne which takes them about five days and goes pretty much directly there, over hill and dale. Ordinarily, I quite envy them as it’s a lovely walk (though, so far, I’ve been too lazy to do it) but it’s a different matter in this kind of weather. Cold and miserable is nice now and again but they’ll be lucky to even get up to Queribus the way it is at the moment.

We’ve even got snow on Canigou which ain’t a good sign this early on: usually it doesn’t even have a dusting for another month or so.

If it’s not sunny, that’s the most common question that we get asked.

It’s also the hardest one to answer.

For instance, right now the weather forecast is saying that it’s sunny when it most definitely isn’t. How come it’s so wrong? Simple really: we’re mid-way between the Pyrenees and the Mediterranean and the weather station is on the coast.

So, once you get out of the main Summer season, it’s quite common for the weather here to be very different from that on the coast. That’s not to say that we get cold weather as such because ordinarily it’s t-shirt weather for 10 or 11 months per year. However, it may be cloudy here when it’s not on the coast. And if it’s cloudy here, it’s probably pretty chilly in the mountains.

You don’t need to go as far as the mountains for it to be chilly though. The Winter usually starts on the western side of the village of St Paul de Fenouillet. Rather strangely, it can be t-shirt weather on the eastern (and higher!) side of the village and snowing on the western side at the same time.

Yesterday was the typical September day over here right up until the late afternoon when it became a little cloudy to the west but now it’s the miserable weather that you’d more typically associate with the west of Ireland rather than the south of France.

It’s become quite cool at night too.

Both aspects are unusual for here as ordinarily we’re running around in t-shirts from March to January.

If this is a sign of colder weather coming along this Winter maybe we’ll need to get some more snow chains. No rush yet though as the snow doesn’t arrive at the ski resorts ’til November.

We’re starting to look around for somewhere to go for our daytrip next week although we’ll need to watch the weather I think ‘cos it’s pouring at the moment.

Anyway, we reckon that anywhere that’s within about two hours drive of here is a runner, subject to there being something to see at that sort of range, of course.

To the south that takes us as far as Barcelona though, as you know, we’ve been there quite a lot and are looking for somewhere different.

The east took us to Avignon which amazed us as we’d thought it would have been four or five hours to get there. There’s quite a lot that way that we’ve not seen of course: Arles is the major place but there’s also Aigues Mort and the Camargue to name but three.

For the north we have Toulouse which we’ve not been to for quite a while and Albi which we’ve not been to at all. Closer than that there are heaps of smaller places under the two hour limit we’ve set ourselves.

We rarely go terribly far to the west so I suspect that there’s quite a lot for us to see that way. Tarbes seems about the limit but that would include Lourdes.

Also in the frame is our next overnight trip for which we’d run to four or perhaps five hours which encompasses a vast tract of France, Spain and even bits of Italy I think. Out as far as Biarittz to the west, Monaco to the east, Valencia to the south and possibly up to the Loire in the north.

Any thoughts as to where would be best?