What do you look for when buying a house in the country? The community?
Schools? Access to work? The lie of the landscape, the aspect and – given
the disasters of summer – the nearest riverbank? Few of us consider one of
the most fundamental aspects: the weather.
Did you know that it rains four times as much in Llanrwst, Snowdonia, as in
Sheringham, Norfolk? Or that Paignton, in Devon, is twice as sunny as
Bradford, in Yorkshire? Inhabitants of the Outer Hebrides put up with 35
days of gales a year on average – no wonder they are famed for their warm
tweeds and winter woollies – whereas the people of Gloucestershire
experience fewer than five.
These may be extremes, but they illustrate just how much the weather varies,
despite the small size of these islands – and how significant a factor it
ought to be in deciding where to live.
Because the prevailing wind comes from the west or southwest, this is where
most of the weather comes from, and where it is wettest. Damp air arrives
from the Atlantic, is forced up over the first high ground it meets – in
Wales, the Lake District or the western Highlands of Scotland – condenses,
then falls. Accordingly, the eastern half of Britain is drier and,
generally, colder. The further north you go, the windier and stormier it
becomes – a weather front of the magnitude of the great storm of 1987, which
damaged one in six insured households, can be expected in the south every
200 or so years. In the Orkneys and Shetlands, however, winds of this
strength blow every 30-40 years, which helps to explain why there are so few
trees.
Then there is the Gulf Stream. The warm Atlantic Ocean current affects the
climate of western Britain profoundly, and makes Cornwall, the Isle of Man
and parts of western Scotland largely frost-free. As a result, these are
areas where subtropical plants and even palms thrive.
There is also plenty of variation within regions. Considering buying a
Scottish holiday hideaway? Braemar, in Scotland, is consistently the coldest
place in Britain, while Tomintoul, just north of the Cairngorm massif, has
the most days of snow. Dedicated frost-lovers in lowland areas should head
for “frost hollows,” lowlying areas where cold air pools. The best-known
examples (and gardeners, in particular, should note this, as more tender
plants will suffer) are Rickmansworth, in Hertfordshire, Houghall, in Co
Durham, and Santon Downham, in Suffolk.
The Scilly Isles are consistently the warmest place in Britain, though
house-hunters seeking winter warmth should head for north Wales. There were
just eight days in January, in the entire 20th century, when temperatures in
Britain reached 17C, and seven of them occurred between Bangor and
Llandudno. This is thanks to the mountain wind that creates unseasonal
warmth on lowlands in the lee of hills. Humidity is an altogether different
sort of heat, and, in July and August, it turns Fort William, in Scotland,
into the midge capital of Britain.
Weymouth, in Dorset, is the sunniest place in Britain, while the coastal strip
from Margate to Portsmouth can expect more than eight hours of sunshine a
day in an average June. The notion of an English Riviera was first
popularised by George III in the late 18th century. It was promoted
enthusiastically by the Edwardian railway companies, which managed to extend
the idea of this climatic zone to Cornwall.
Keen fell walkers looking for a Lake District bolt hole should beware the
wettest inhabited place in England: the hamlet of Seathwaite, Cumbria.
Blaenau Ffestiniog and Fort William take the crown for Wales and Scotland
respectively. The driest place, with an average of just 513mm of rain a
year, is St Osyth, five miles west of Clacton-on-Sea, in Essex – dry enough,
by some definitions, to qualify as a desert region. The myth of Manchester
being our wettest city is just that – a myth. Penzance, Plymouth and Swansea
are all wetter.
In lowland areas, exposed Atlantic headlands are windiest, which means most of
Cornwall and the Western Isles of Scotland, the Orkneys and the Shetlands.
Coastal areas are also subject to sea breezes in the daytime and land
breezes by night during the warmer half of the year. Inland, the sites of
former windmills will be exposed (or “well winded”, as an estate agent might
put it).
The east side of the Lake District has Britain’s only named wind, the Helm, a
howling easterly that roars down off the top (or “helm”) of Cross Fell, in
the Pennines at up to 90mph, sometimes for days at a time. It affects only
about 10 villages, but can be so maddening that agents say it has an adverse
impact on property prices. If you like wind – if you are a paraglider, or
passionate about flying kites – a home in the Black Mountains of south Wales
would be ideal.
Buy a house that sits higher than 1,000ft and you may spend weeks of the year
immersed in a foggy gloom – although you may also experience occasions when
a temperature inversion fills the valleys below with cloud, leaving you
smugly above it all in a Jack-and-the-Beanstalk landscape. Dartmoor hosts
our best-known fogs, but the Vale of York is also reliably murky. For sea
fogs, the east coast of Scotland is the place: up the Spey valley, the first
creeping tendrils of haars, as they are known locally, often appear in late
afternoon.
Finally, anyone scared of lightning should steer clear of Thunderstorm Alley,
a belt stretching from Thetford to Stoke-on-Trent. They should choose
Newcastle or north Scotland instead, where thunderstorms are scarcest.
Bizarrely, for all the diversity of the British weather – and its prominence
in our conversation – no accessible, popular guide to its regional
characteristics is available. Nor do estate agents exploit it as much as
they might. The Met Office can supply a mass of minutely detailed data, but,
unless you are a professional meteorologist, you are probably better off
asking a local farmer about conditions before buying.
So what is the best buy for the dedicated weather-watcher, someone who wants
to experience the full force of the spectrum of British weather from the
comfort of their own home? Snap up a remote property high up on a hillside,
facing west. Even better, buy a lighthouse.
The Wrong Kind of Snow: The Complete Daily Companion to the British Weather
by Antony Woodward and Robert Penn (Hodder & Stoughton £14.99) is
available for the special price of £13.49, including p&p, through
The Sunday Times BooksFirst; 0870 165 8585, timesonline.co.uk/booksfirst
What it’s like where you are
Sunniest Weymouth, Dorset
Wettest Seathwaite, Cumbria
Driest St Osyth, Essex
Warmest Scilly Isles
Coldest Braemar, Scotland
Stormiest Thetford to Stoke-on-Trent
Windiest Cornwall/west coast
Foggiest Dartmoor, Devon
Most snow Tomintoul, Scotland
