If you’re hankering after some winter sunshine then usually the Canary Islands would do the trick. With average winter temperatures of 22 C (72 F) and around six hours of sunshine per day, it makes a change from blustery old Blighty.
However, earlier this week an area of low pressure and its associated weather front ground to a halt near the Canary Islands, and it all turned rather wet and miserable. Lanzarote, the most northeasterly of the islands, received 34 mm (1.3 inches) of rain in just 30 hours. That is nearly as much rain as the island would expect to receive throughout the whole of December.
Things are set to improve in the Canaries by the end of the week, so don’t despair if you are heading off there to escape our winter weather.
If, like me, you’re stuck in the UK, then you’ll have to hold on tightly to your Christmas shopping over the next few days. Thursday, in particular, is set to be wet and very windy with gusts of 70 mph possible across parts of Scotland and Northern Ireland.
The windy weather will continue into the weekend, and it looks like we’ll get some snow on higher ground across central and northern parts of the UK.
