Phuket Weather

High Season but not Dry Season (yet)

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 12:53:00 +0000

Yes, contrary to popular belief there is not a tap ("faucet" if you are American) in the sky which is magically turned off on a certain day. The seasons blur into one another. I have tried to explain before. We do not have a clear cut "wet" and "dry" season. Yes, some months are statistically wetter than others. Unlikely that September will be drier than January... but months like April and November, at the edges of the season can get plenty of rain, even if they are classified as high season. The Phuket rainfall averages show that November is the wettest of the high season months, but with way less rainfall (on average) compared to October.

So over the last few days, we have had daily rain, mostly in the evening, though Tuesday it was pretty wet all day. The wind has switched absolutely to the East/North East and has been quite breezy for 2 days, though tonight I feel things have calmed down, and the forecast looks good on Windguru. Over on the east coast of Thailand, the NE winds are a bad thing, as Camille says today in his Koh Samui blog - "Rain's coming down in heaps and nonstop, sometimes it drizzles and sometimes it just pours". November in Samui is like May in Phuket, but as here the rain does not last forever.

We are in high season now for scuba diving. Dive trips heading out to the Similan Islands every day. Want to dive - have a look at Sunrise Divers :)

A couple of photos.. on Saturday we were happy to find that one of our favourite restaurants had reopened (they close in low season). "The Beach Bar" is so quiet and friendly, nicely out of the way, miles from the main beaches. A place I can happily sit for hours.

Monday was Loy Krathong - a big festival in some parts of Thailand. Everyone still "does it" in Phuket although it's more important in parts of Northern Thailand. The last few years we have been to Bang Wad reservoir to float our Krathong - see photos from Loy Krathong 2008... but this year, we decided that the Beach Bar was the place to be! Quiet, just a few people. Suits us perfectly.

Praying for sunny skies and a trouble free high season - see you in Phuket! If you are reading this and have not yet booked a hotel - I suggest looking at Agoda.com - hotels in Phuket, Bangkok and all over Thailand. Cheers!

Vegetarian Weather and Changing Seasons

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 14:11:00 +0000

Jamie humbly apologises for not updating the weather blog for 10 days. Several reasons - getting busy at work with high season just about kicking off for scuba diving, also our internet at home is broken, plus it has been the Phuket Vegetarian festival, which ran from 17th - 26th October. The weather at this very second - raining.. again. For the last 10 days almost every day has had some rain, but mostly in the night. The seasons are changing now. This is not monsoon rain, just a good old tropical downpour. There has been hardly any wind, the South West winds stopped blowing last week.. and today there was a noticeable North East breeze. Clouds were drifting across the sky from that direction, so I think we can say.. as far as weather is concerned, it's high season now.

Time to dive! The main season for scuba diving starts now, although there is some decent diving year round if you get good weather. Our number 1 destination is the Similan Islands, the best diving in Thailand. At Sunrise Divers, we can offer liveaboard trips from 2 - 10 days to the Similans and even into Burmese waters. We also have day trips to many sites, overnight trips and we're a PADI 5 star dive resort. Hope to see you at our shop in Karon Beach!

Here's a couple of photos from Vegetarian Festival street processions last weekend. For a lot more, have a look at my Phuket blog: Vegetarian Festival Photos 2009.

I do love the vegetarian festival! And it's festival season here right now... let's ignore Halloween, although my daughter will be dressed as a witch at school tomorrow... On Monday it's Loy Krathong - have a look at some photos from last year : Loy Krathong Festival 2008.

OH, and I should mention - coming up on November 7th - next Saturday - The Great Phuket Rubber Duck Race! It's a charity event, all proceeds going into the Phuket Community Foundation fund. You can buy a rubber duck even if you are not in Phuket. On race day, numbered ducks will be launched into a canal... and will float off downstream... the first 6 across the line will win some great prizes for those who bought them. Have a look - BUY A DUCK! It's all for charity, so even if you don't win 4 nights at the Banyan Tree, at least you are doing something good. Have a look: http://www.phuketcharity.org/duck/

Looks like (almost) HI season in Phuket

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 08:20:00 +0000

I apologise for having no updates for nearly 2 weeks on the Phuket weather blog. Sometimes real life is quite busy, so the virtual blogging, facebooking world has to take a back seat. Last update was 4th October - we were having a lovely sunny weekend... but then it all went wet again. I did update a few weather notices on Twitter - you can follow me on Twitter... http://twitter.com/jamiemonk. The wind and rain returned for several days from 5th October meaning a few cancelled dive trips, though I think our cancelled customers were quite relieved that the decision has been made for them. Yep, it was really wet for a few days and the wind forecasts were showing possible 12 foot waves at the Similan Islands.

From 8th - 15th October I had a little holiday. Just a week to relax before high season arrives and the dive shop (hopefully) overflows with customers! We drove from Phuket to Chumphon on the 8th, about 400km or halfway to Bangkok. Was very wet when we left and rain was very heavy in Phang Nga, lots of big pools of water on the roads. Not a great day for driving. Was slightly better on the Gulf of Thailand side, though the drizzle kept up most of the way from Surat Thani to Chumphon. A couple photos below snapped from car window.

On the 10th we drove to Prachuap Khiri Khan which we visited for the first time last year. I like this little town. Last year we found a little guesthouse right on the bay, this year we stayed a couple of nights - Sun Beach Guesthouse. We sat in the evening on the bayfront with a view across the town...

11th - we were at Ao Manao in the morning, a very popular beach for locals in the Prachuap area, also attracting visitors from Bangkok. Rather a grey morning for the beach and the afternoon was rainy.

On the 12th, we visited Khao Sam Roy Yot national park, lots of mountains and caves in the area. We headed for Tham Phraya Nakhon, which is a famous cave that has been visited by several Kings of Thailand and is the symbol of Prachuap Khiri Khan province.

We drove back home to Phuket on the 14th, a lovely sunny day except for some rain around Phang Nga again. Looks like the weather is heading to high season now. On the 15th, a relaxing day at home, took the kids for ice cream and a walk at Bang Wad reservoir in the evening. The reservoir was looking nice and full.. hardly surprising, it's not been the driest of low seasons!

Friday and Saturday were both warm sunny days. Saturday evening was the start of the Phuket vegetarian festival, which I like to blog a lot! There will be photos of processions on the Phuket blog over the coming 2 weeks. Saturday was the "Pole Raising" ceremony where a 20 meter high pole is hoisted up to the skies at all participating shrines. The gods are said to descend the poles into the shrines. I took a few photos, but my poor camera decided to give me Error 99 just as the pole raising started.

Sunday - that's today - started wet, got drier, and the afternoon is nice and sunny. High season is just about here. No more strong winds I think, but we do get rain and thunderstorms at the start of high season - nothing to spoil a holiday, but even in Phuket the sun does not shine 24 hours per day.

All Sunny Again in Phuket

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 13:41:00 +0000

Yes, it's sunburn weather again. Seems like it's been very wet recently. I got the September rainfall figures from Steen in Patong (from whose data I made the Phuket Rainfall Averages) and September was wetter than the average. And now we enter October, which is the wettest month of the year (on average) although we expect the seasonal SW monsoon winds to stop blowing sometime in the coming weeks.

The last few days have all been hot and sunny.. OK there was some rain in the night on Friday after a real hot day. The sea has calmed down, divers have been out enjoying their dives and I got a red neck on Saturday from doing a bit of gardening. After much of last week being very wet as we caught the edge of Ketsana, things started to calm down on Thursday, which was still a bit wet, but by Friday it was all change - a hot sunny day all day. I took a quick walk on Karon Beach at lunchtime...

Despite the blue skies, the sea was still looking rough. This year has been quite bad for drownings around Phuket. Blue skies and holidays do not mean the sea is safe for swimming. Red flags are not there to decorate the beach. Please take care at the beaches during the low season.

High season is on the way, the weather will be changing soon, but at the moment the wind is steady from the west. A steady wind is manageable for dive boats. People said it was a bit bouncy the last 2 days, but nice visibility in the water. On Tuesday our first liveaboard customers of the season are heading out to the Similan Islands. At this time of year it's a bit hit and miss, but things are looking good right now.

Typhoon Ketsana Satellite Animation

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 12:18:00 +0000

Typhoon Ketsana did not hit us here in Phuket. As far as I am aware, no typhoon has ever hit Phuket, and only one tropical storm has ever hit Thailand at Typhoon strength - that was Typhoon Gay in 1989 which hit my wifes home province of Chumphon. But as mentioned in the last weather blog post, Typhoon Ketsana was a big one, hitting the Philippines and Vietnam and dumping plenty of rain over SE Asia.

The video below was taken from a great website called "Digital Typhoon" which has satellite pictures and animations going back 30 years! Have a look...

http://agora.ex.nii.ac.jp/digital-typhoon/region/SEasia/1/

The animation below was saved on September 30th and shows 7 days of weather activity. You can see Ketsana growing and moving west, finally dissipating over Cambodia/Thailand a few days ago.

On the edge of Typhoon Ketsana

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 14:40:00 +0000

It's all sunny again today, still rather windy, but over the last few days the monsoon didst blow. It's amazing how few really rough days you get in the low season, when you add it up. So many sunny days, many "decent" days and not much in the way of holiday-spoiling weather... But we had it this week! September ended with lots of wind and plenty of rain too, although a lot of that was at night.

I am going to stick my neck out and say this is the final big blow of the SW monsoon. Winds are steady now from the west or southwest, waves from the west, looks set to be a bit bouncy at sea for another week at least. Hopefully all blown out by the time the vegetarian festival starts on the 17th. Oh and for my little holiday which will start around the 9th, heading north via Chumphon to Kanchanaburi.

The normal SW monsoon was exaggerated this week as we certainly caught a distant corner of Typhoon Ketsana, which had already caused plenty of misery in the Philippines on the 25th - 26th September - some photos here (some rather graphic). The storm was a big one and dashed across the South China Sea to hit Vietnam on the 28th. From the 27th to the 29th, even though the storm hit land in Vietnam over 1,000km from Phuket, we surely got some extra rain and wind. It was a big storm system.

This excellent website has satellite pics and animations. If you look now you can see an animation from the last 7 days that clearly shows Ketsana build up and head west before dissipating over Vietnam/Cambodia:

http://agora.ex.nii.ac.jp/digital-typhoon/region/SEasia/1/

I have saved the current 7 day animation, may try to upload as a video later.

The weather had improved by last night, the sky was clear and although it was a bit grey this morning, today has been a hot sunny day in Phuket. The Windguru forecast looks good for the weekend, maybe a bit blowy next week but nothing too serious.

Poor Philippines is going to be hit again, though. Another storm called "Parma" is heading towards the north of the islands and on to Taiwan, and Parma is expected hit hit category 5, which is bad. It's not heading west though, so I don't believe we will see any effects here. The Tropical Storm Risk website is a great place for storm information. You can also register for email updates.

• Typhoon Parma - Updates on Tropicalstormrisk.com

The new storm is very clear and very big on the satellite link above too.

And if that was not enough, there have been 2 earthquakes and a tsunami this week. First, a quake in the pacific ocean on Tuesday night (17:48 GMT.. I guess that would actually be Tuesday morning in Samoa), creating a tsunami that hit Tonga and Samoa - see BBC Report.

And then, yesterday afternoon local time (10:00 GMT) a big quake (See USGS details) in southern Sumatra - lots of damage - BBC Report. Epicenter about 1,00km south of here. There was apparently a tsunami alert issued here in Phuket, though I did not know about it. Alert was quickly withdrawn. Good to know people are on their toes. Updates from Sumatra are talking about more than 450 deaths - new BBC Report. New Update... over 750 deaths.. updated Thursday evening.... over 1100 Friday morning. Grim

Meanwhile back in Phuket. Still sunny, hoping for a beautiful weekend. Update later on Thursday - well, not all sun, had some rain later afternoon and in the night...

Changeable weather in Phuket

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 01:38:00 +0000

Don't ask me what the weather will be like tomorrow! This is now typically unpredictable proper low season weather. Feels like low season is coming to an end. This kind of windy, wet weather with some lovely sunny days in between tends to happen just before the seasons change.

The week started with sunny days, just as we had last weekend when I last updated the blog. Sorry for the 6 day delay, but sometimes having a job and a family does have to come first :) Blogging time is a luxury item!

Monday and Tuesday were pretty sunny. Wednesday started clear but got wet in the afternoon. Wednesday showed the localised nature of the rain. Clouds do tend to hang around over the hills in Phuket. We had divers out at Racha Yai island, about 15km south of Phuket. They had a hot sunny day and only saw any rain upon getting back to the mainland. Thursday was all cloud, some rain, and then Friday 25th was a contender for wettest day of the year.

I should try to update more often here, but don't want to post something as minimal as "today is sunny and 32 degrees". There are sometimes mini weather updates on Twitter, and lots of weather links on the left of the page for latest satellite, radar, wind, webcams etc...

Today (Saturday) started sunny , but it's windy and the afternoon has been mostly grey. At a friends house near Kathu Waterfall this morning, the butterflies were out in the morning sun and I chased them...

Forecast for this week does not look great. Looks like lots of wet and windy weather to come as the low season blows itself out....

Changes in the weather

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 09:38:00 +0000

Well, I was almost correct last time. Weather has now changed for the better. Today (Sunday) a glorious sunny day, as was most of yesterday and a good deal of Friday. The winds have all calmed down too. Great diving weather this week. If you were here last week... well, better luck next time :)

Yesterday morning I awoke early, planning a visit to a temple. Trying to get the early morning light and planning to get back early so we could still have a nice family day. Wat Luang Pu Supha temple is home to possibly (subject to ratification) the oldest living man in the world. It was his birthday last week. He is 113. Makes you feel kind of young!

The weather decided to play games with me. Was rather a grey morning, but I wanted to blog this temple anyways. After looking at the temple, I drove up the road behind, which heads up into the hills heading west...

And then the light drizzle turned to heavy rain. Minor flooding on the roads, windscreen wipers on full throttle!

I liked this tree near the temple. The road behind the temple is very scenic, I will drive up there again. Looks like a nice area for a bit of a walk.

Now, that heavy rain was about 7km from my house. When I got back, the garden was dry. There had been no rain! By early afternoon, the sky was clear and blue and I enjoyed taking some sun for what seemed like the first time in ages. The kids stayed sensibly in the shade...

And as the sun streamed through the window, my wife prepared some food for a little dinner with friends. It was nice to sit outside to eat dinner in the early evening.

I can feel it in my fingers

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 09:17:00 +0000

Rain is all around me, it's everywhere I go. Boy oh boy, some wet days! Rained all night and most of this morning, but has now dried up late afternoon. I had planned to take a day off today, but awoke to grey skies, a soggy garden and continual rain. Yep, these days do happen! September is (I reckon) the grottiest month of the year. According to the averages, October gets more rain, but by October the westerly winds are disappearing. Right now you get wind and rain and ... well, I don't suppose many people would have been sunbathing at Kata beach today.

Photos above - Kata Beach this morning about 9am. Waves right to the top of the beach. Beach chairs being taken by the sea.. no sign of the owners of the chairs. Nobody about at all except that guy going running.

The forecast looks much better starting tomorrow. I think the weekend will be sunny. In fact I can feel the brightness coming back to the sky right now. So tomorrow will be a day off, plan to head for a nice lunch somewhere, just me and my wife. Last chance before school holidays and then high season starts again.

God is playing with the hosepipe

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 09:24:00 +0000

The last few days have all been very similar. A bit of sun, a bit of rain, sun breaks through again, then it rains again. Sunday was probably the nicest day of the week, though the rain kept on coming in little showers. In the evening, having a cup of coffee outside we could see stars. Then 2 minutes later, rain. Then 2 minutes later, we could see stars again! I think God's hosepipe is set on sprinkler mode. Really the entire last 6 days has been very similar. Not much wind, some heavy showers followed by sun, then another shower. For once the weather forecasts are correct with that little cloud/rain/sun symbol, which means "er.. we don't know, but if we put THIS symbol we'll be right all the time".

So, the weather in Phuket is like this at the moment:

September is the quietest month in Phuket for tourism. The weather does tend to be a bit crap on average, although there are sunny days, and it's no like we get typhoons or anything like that. So things are quiet now in the dive shop, time to get those last low season jobs done, as high season will be upon us soon. Time now to service dive gear, make changes to the website, and restock the shop.

A couple of photos from last week...

(above) Driving towards Kata beach, 9am, 10th September.

(above) Rural Phuket. We took a drive around on Saturday, a mostly wet day. This cute long eared cow came to check out the car.

Will be school holidays in a couple of weeks. Kids get a month off in between terms. We will take a week away from Phuket, but back in time for the vegetarian festival that starts on 18th October.

By the way, you may have noticed, the Karon beach webcam at Marina resort seems to be down again... There is another one (working) at Twin Palms resort, Surin Beach, check it out.

Ou est le soleil? Ici!

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 14:38:00 +0000

Another change in the weather. So Saturday was a BAAAAD day, lots of rain, but then it all changed. It (the weather) does this often at this time of year. Change. Change. I can't update this blog often enough! Sunday was a nice sunny day, yeh. Of course. My day off was Saturday (the sh*t day). So on Sunday, back in the office, yes, sunny, lovely. Thanks. Ou est le soleil? Dans la tete. Travaillez.

Monday and Today have also been sunny. No rain. Well, we had enough on Saturday to last a week! Sure, we can expect plenty more precipitation in the next 6 weeks. According to the Phuket rainfall averages, September (2nd) and October (1st) are the wettest months of the year. But for now, enjoy that sun!

This evening I detoured on the way home, took the winding road up towards the Big Buddha, stopping off near the top of the hill at a little restaurant where they have cold beers and great sunset views over Karon beach and the Andaman Sea...

Highs and Lows

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 15:31:00 +0000

As noted a couple of days ago, Friday morning I was due to take a hike to the top of Phuket's highest hill/mountain, well over 500m above sea level, near Kathu Waterfall. The weather forecast looked like some wind and rain might come, but the morning looked pretty clear. The full story of this hike is on the Phuket blog: Hiking to the Roof of Phuket. With regards to the weather, a little more cloud cover would have been welcome on the way up. I am not so fit these days, and a hike involving 440m of vertical ascent from the start point was a challenge. Was quite hot in the morning, although clouds did appear we had no rain. Rain would have made the ascent and in particular the descent very tricky, as the path was steep and slippery in places. Long story short. Made it to the summit, big round of applause for the fat panda. Many thanks to Glenn! A photo of the view from part way up the hill...

Exactly how lucky were we with the weather? I mean, if we'd had heavy rain on that walk, it would have been very tough, and downhill would have been dangerous. But the weather held off... until early this morning. Today (Saturday) has been very wet, windy, one of those real "monsoon" days. They don't happen too often (and I hope this blog helps to prove that point), but when you get one of these days, well, you can't do much. I was woken at 7am by the wind and rain which continued more or less without stopping until lunchtime. How bad was the weather? A couple of reports in the Phuket Gazette from today...

• Roof collapse at SuperCheap
• Phuket pounded by monsoon weather

Well, actually this afternoon was not too bad, we had a little family party at a friend's house, kids played in the pool. No rain this evening. The headline "pounded by monsoon weather" is a bit scary, but it's not that bad!.. unless you are on holiday and planning a nice day by the beach.

Here's a pic at Karon Beach, thanks to Kerry for the photo:

We had a brief power cut last week during the night, no big deal, we always keep candles around, though my little boy got scared when all the lights and fans and everything else went off. I bought a torch today in Tesco and it just got it's first use.. another power cut as I was doing this blog page. Was off for about 45 minutes, kids did not wake up, torch very useful :) Not sure why power went off. All the wind and rain was earlier in the day. Now it's pretty calm and there has been no rain for a couple of hours. Might be another wet one tomorrow. Well, it's got to rain sometime :)

One more photo from Friday, just got some pics from Glenn. This is me up on top of Phuket's highest hill. The top is about 542m above sea level.

Please don't rain!

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 13:51:00 +0000

Just a quick look at the Phuket weather radar right now shows no rain around, the satellite photo does not show anything scary, although the Windguru forecast predicts strong winds coming in tomorrow for a few days. Hopefully just winds and not too much rain. Had enough of that last week!

The week so far has been OK, a bit of a blur to be honest. Mid life crisis time. Some days are just a blur of getting kids to school, work, getting kids to bed again and trying to find some "quality time" with them, with my wife and some of that much neglected "me" time! The weather follows life's pattern. It's a blur. Mostly quite nice this week, not much rain, plenty of sun. I would go so far as to say "very pleasant" weather this week. We are into September which is often touted as the wettest month of the year, although according to the Phuket Rainfall Averages based on the data sent to me by a local resident, October holds that honour. OK, we are only 3 days into September, but it's good so far :)

I have not been anywhere taking photos this week. Work has been surprisingly busy. Lots of emails, and lots of people booking for their high season liveaboard diving trips. Global recession? Well, maybe we are out of it, or maybe divers just think "**** it, let's go diving!"

I will take some photos tomorrow morning. Have made a plan to walk to the top of the highest hill in Phuket, well over 500m (1700 feet) above sea level. Meeting a local expat resident who is well known in Phuket. He wrote some posts on his blog about hiking in the hills in Phuket and so I am happy to have the chance to get in a walk with him - see his blog here : Fiddlehead in Phuket. It should be quite a walk, starting at Kathu Waterfall, up through the jungle. I am expecting some good photos and some aching legs!

Cheers for now... and pleeeease don't rain tomorrow morning!

Rain, sniffles, more rain

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 13:20:00 +0000

What a wet week! Bad luck if you came this week for your one week holiday. Last week was much nicer.. and next week probably will be too.. I am awaiting the end of the month for the official rainfall data for August. Reckon that, although there was lots of sun, the last week has made up for any shortfall in water supply! Boy oh boy....

Last update on this blog was on Wednesday... after that, Thursday was not real wet, not sunny either, but I was feeling a bit "under the weather" and did not go to work, slept half the afternoon. These sudden changes in weather from hot to raining-cats-and-dogs play havoc with people's health! Lots of coughs and colds at this time of year. Our son was rather sniffly too, no fever though and we bundled him off to school on Friday with some medicine in his bag.

Friday - very, very wet day. We waz drownin! Rained all day, sometimes heavy. Reports of localised flooding on the roads all over the island. Not really windy, though... this kind of rain is more normal later in the low season. Heavy, straight down. Did you bring your umbrella? I was at Karon Beach all day. I'll say again - WET! Here's a photo I took on the way home - it's on the road between Chalong Bay and Phuket Town.

That little flood was repeated in many places around the island. Nothing too serious, but the drains do struggle sometimes. Was all gone by the next day. A rather more serious effect of the rain was seen on the road between Patong Beach and Phuket Town. It's a big hill and you can get some rivers rolling downhill on wet days... But this time, rain had undermined the road surface and created a sink hole. Luckily nobody drove into it...

More about the hole and more photos - Phuket Gazette or Phuket Wan.

According to this report in Phuket Wan, August rainfall total last year: 252.9mm; August so far this year: 490.9mm... According to the data I received from Steen, a Danish resident in Patong, that is certainly more than average but there have been wetter Augusts in 1998 and 2000.. of course, as the Phuket Wan article points out, there is a lot of fluctuation in rainfall over the island.

Saturday was slightly less wet, but certainly not a day for getting a tan. Seemed like dark clouds appeared, dropped their load and moved on every 30 minutes. We moved the laundry outside, back inside, back outside, back inside (a fascinating life we do lead). Rain managed to hold off for a little birthday party at a friends house in the evening.

Sunday, plenty more rain, but certainly better than the previous 2 days. I was again rather off colour, slept until late morning, but headed out in the afternoon to find some lunch, a drive and some fresh air. Almost a nice day... plenty of dark cloud, rain here and there, but some sun too. Looking more hopeful for next week. It was a nice drive, we headed via Kamala to the Cherng Talay area, which is home to Phuket's largest mosque:

We hit Layan Beach for lunch.. there is one small restaurant right by the beach. There were only 2 other customers. Ah! Low season! Yeh, OK it was not perfect weather, but the sun did shine and lunch was tasty, the air was fresh.

Not so sunny this week!

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 06:02:00 +0000

Seems like the weather often does a quick change the day after I update the weather blog! On Saturday, and for most of the preceding week, we had "almost perfect" weather. There was some rain on Saturday here and there, and more importantly the west winds started to blow again. So I guess it was not a total surprise to have a wet Sunday. A very wet Sunday, wind blowing, rain lashing down for half the day. Wettest day for ages. One of those days when, should someone come into the dive shop, I say "You should have been here last week"!

Were the sea conditions really that bad? Well, the Phuket Gazette reports that a Bulk Carrier transporting over 1000 tonnes of logs sank due to heavy seas off Phang Nga, just north of Phuket. Says the waves were 2m, wind 35kph maximum. That certainly should not be enough to sink a big boat. The archive data on Windguru and on the Nai Yang beach weather station (see links on the left of the page) also show no really strong winds. How odd.

More importantly, Sunday was a good day for English cricket! :)

Monday was also a bit wet, less so than Sunday.. even a bit of sun later on in the day. I promised some customers some sun on Tuesday for their dive trip.. and lo! Tuesday was a nice sunny day. Just call me .... who are the weather gods? Google search... Well, the best known "sun god" would be Ra (Egyptian), but there is also Helius (Greek) or Inti (Inca) or Surya (Hindu) to name but a few. Meanwhile, if you want rain, just call Zeus (Greek), Tlaloc (Aztec) or Frey (Viking). All the old civilisations had a hatful of deities all with their own specialties!

Meanwhile, the same Google search gave me this article:

Does God control the Weather? Does He send deadly storms?

He has His reasons, apparently it's far too complicated for us to understand. And anyway, don't worry coz Revelations tells us that God will clean up the world eventually, only allowing believers into the new world where there will be NO bad weather. Ever. At the risk of offending God squad readers, I will make no comment.

Except this:

Here's a couple of photos... Thanks to James at Amazing Bike Tours - they had some cycling tours at Koh Yao Noi on Sunday and Tuesday. Yes, Sunday in the rain! But you know they say rain always looks worse through a window. Once you're out in it, once you are already soaked, it's not so bad! Well, that argument applies here, as the rain is warmish. Does not apply to Yorkshire.

Guess which of these photos is Sunday, and which is Tuesday...

Wednesday already? A bit wet today, too. Not a sunny day. For absolute latest weather, right now, check the links on the left (webcam, weather station, weather radar in particular).

So, let us pray for sun.

Ooh! What a hypocrite!

Almost perfect weather in Phuket

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 14:54:00 +0000

Almost perfect.. taking into account that this is supposed to be the low/rainy/monsoon season. I would hope that if you have followed this blog or checked out the archive links to previous months (going back to 2006) you might begin to realise that the low season (now renamed the 'SUMMER SEASON') is not too bad, indeed sometimes it's great. There are no half truths here on the weather blog.

I do reckon we are just about in for a change again, though. All week has been pretty sunny, light winds continuing.. sometimes even blowing from the east, which is backwards for this time of year. Should be westerly/southwesterly winds. On Wednesday, I took a day off from work to allow some extra family time. I had already seen the Windguru forecast which predicted a wetter day, and indeed I recommended to some diving customers to dive Thursday rather than Wednesday... There was some rain Tuesday evening, you could see a band of rain coming from the east on the Phuket weather radar. But it only lasted a couple of hours and was not heavy. Same happened on Wednesday afternoon, rain coming from the east. But again, nothing heavy. From the east? What happened here?!

Thursday and Friday - more sunshine, light winds, great diving conditions, great for anything really! Except sailing or surfing perhaps. There is another surf contest coming up in early September at Kata beach, and it does seem to me that they tend to get rather flat seas at that time of year. Check my weather report from about the same time of year in 2007 - surfers trying to catch a wave.. with no waves!

Today (Saturday) - mostly decent weather, but lots of small isolated rain showers. We had a relaxing day.. rather odd weather. We half planned some time at the beach, but from our house we saw lots of dark clouds around, looked like rain.. so we headed for a late breakfast at Leelawadee. During the 45 minutes we were in the restaurant, the skies all cleared up. Blue with a few fluffy, friendly clouds... so we took a trip up to the Big Buddha.

I had a little camera play before we left - photos of reflections in the wing mirror of da pick up truck (nicknamed Optimus Prime)...

Up on the Mountain we had sunshine, while from the high viewpoint we could see localised showers moving across the landscape...

The winds were not strong today, but certainly blowing from the west again, so last weeks light east winds are over. Windguru does not predict any strong winds next week, but west winds will bring more rain than east winds as they are blowing over the Indian Ocean. Looks OK for next week, but maybe some showers.

Meanwhile, the first big Atlantic hurricane has been on the move. They called it "Bill". My dad is called Bill. Not a very scary name. The naming of hurricanes should be updated I think. Keep the alphabet, but not "Bill".. Let's say "Hurricane Bast**d". Well, actually Bill did not do much damage, but I saw the effects of Hurricane Mitch on Honduras back in 1998. Mitch sounds like a nice guy. Hurricane should have been "Hurricane M*therF***er". Killed thousands.

Meanwhile. It's coming home, it's coming home, the Ashes are coming home! (unless it rains for 2 days in London).

Have a nice weekend!

Perfect Days in Phuket

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 02:13:00 +0000

The last few days have been really hot, up into the mid 30's Celsius, hardly any wind, hotter than high season. Saturday I even got a bit of sunburn after spending time in the garden. Gardens need a lot of looking after at this time of year. The mix of rainy spells, winds blowing leaves all over the place, and then hot days drying up all your lotus pots means I try to do a big weekly clean up - raking leaves, watering thirsty plants, pulling up weeds (weeds being anything that I don't want growing). In months like January or February you need to do far less, as there's not much rain and things don't grow so much.

Karon Beach looking good right now. The photo above was taken on Sunday morning. Small waves, and indeed today (check the live Karon Beach Webcam) it's really calm, good enough for snorkeling I'd say. Or diving. All instructors are saying dive conditions are perfect right now, with the calm seas and good visibility at all dive sites.

There has been some build up of dark clouds over the last 2 days but it's not come to anything like a thunderstorm, although you'd expect a localised storm with this kind of windless heat. There were clouds in the sky last night and a few spots of rain this morning, but by now (9am) it's looking like another hot day. Photo below is the sunset and sky as seen from my house, looking west towards the hills.

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Forecast looks like at least a few more hot and calm days. And then we'll all be hoping for a rainy day to cool off :)

Viva el sol!

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 09:04:00 +0000

Yes, the sun has got his hat on again. The weather did a huge about turn after being kind of wet and windy last week. By Monday the winds had eased, the waves at the beaches were much smaller and it's been sunny all week (except in the night time).

I took a little walk at Kata Beach on Tuesday evening around quarter past 5. Actually looked surprisingly busy with people getting the last dose of afternoon sun. When I take a walk on the beach after work and see tourists sunning themselves, playing with their kids, jogging along the sand, walking hand in hand it gives me a sense of happiness, because everyone around is happy. It also makes me wish I was on permanent holiday. Sure, I do live here, but have less time to enjoy Phuket than I'd like. Don't be thinking this is a dream life. Work, driving to work, dropping kids at school, bills to pay, mortgage, loans, school bills. It's like a "normal" life. But in Phuket :)

This photo from Kata Beach on Tuesday, first posted on my Twitpic page:

See, yesterday was Mothers Day, the birthday of HM Queen Sirikit. Happy Birthday Ma'am. It's a public holiday so my kids had the day off. Having discovered a place to go kayaking a couple of weeks ago, my wife and the kids went again with some friends. Hey! No fair! I wanna go too! But we don't close the dive shop on public holidays. Did manage a swim/splash about with the kids later at the pool near our house. Well, I try to swim, but the kids tend to attach themselves like barnacles. Doing a 25 meter length with a big 8 year old girl hanging on my back is good exercise!

More sun today. Roll on Saturday. Please stay sunny.

Meanwhile that Typhoon Morakot has been very nasty indeed, dumping huge rainfall on Taiwan and eastern China. If you want to track tropical storms all over the globe, I like the Tropical Storm Risk website - you can sign up for storm updates by email (I have).

Meanwhile, here in Phuket.. Sun is shining, weather is sweet.

Windy, Showers and Sunny Spells

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 06:18:00 +0000

The last few days have not seen any spectacular weather. The wind has continued to be quite strong, patches of sun, showers of rain dotted all over the island. No real heavy or sustained rain, but enough to force you to sit round the bar with a cold beer rather than sunbathing :) Was quite lucky to get a rain free street procession in my local village on Wednesday night (see photos here), but on Thursday morning it was nice and wet again. Now, in general I think driving in Phuket (in a car) is not dangerous. The roads are not too fast, and except for the occasional loony, people tend to drive pretty well. No worse than "back home" anyways.

BUT, seems to me that anytime it rains, you'll find a truck in a ditch on one of the many hills around Phuket. Often between Patong and Phuket Town, often - like this one - between Kata and Chalong. I tend to avoid getting close to big trucks on hills in the rain. This was on Thursday...

Friday was similarly blustery and showery with patchy sunshine. We may have just been catching the very edge of a tropical storm centered off the east coast of Vietnam which has all gone now. In all the time I have been here, Phuket has never been hit by anything like a tropical storm.

For the record, Thailand has only ever once been hit by a storm with Typhoon strength winds. This was Typhoon Gay in 1989. My wife remembers it well, as it struck Chumphon province on the east coast and her family home was flooded.

Saturday also rather showery, but again we got lucky and a friend's party for their kids birthday was rain free in the afternoon/evening. Seemed like the wind was dropping off on Saturday night, and sure enough, although yesterday had some showers too, it was much sunnier and calmer by the late afternoon. I could really feel the weather change from about 3 - 4pm. Today is much nicer and the forecast on Windguru looks good for the week and next weekend. Already planning a day out on Saturday.

Meanwhile, Typhoon Morakot has been kicking the cr*p out of Taiwan - check this video on YouTube. I am glad to be in a Typhoon free zone, and so will not be complaining about a few wet and windy days! For now, the sun has got his hat on again. Hip Hip Hip Hooray!

Praying it won't rain

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 12:47:00 +0000

The last Phuket weather report a few days back was all sun, sun, sun, which is often the case in a normal summer season, especially July which I'd say is the best of the summer months for weather. Not perfect to be sure, can be windy and the beaches are often too rough to swim safely, but a little rain is good for everyone, and very good for all the tropical foliage in Phuket, so this time of year is also called Green Season.

Lovely. Sunshine, greenery, I do like this time of year. And then the bad news.

In 2007, in bad weather, there was a plane crash in Phuket. A bad one. Lots of people died.

On Tuesday afternoon, just after 2:30pm I got a newsflash in my inbox from the Thaivisa.com website. Plane Crash in Koh Samui. Heavy rain, plane skidded off the runway and hit a building. Here's the Thai Visa Forum thread about it. I think all around Thailand, we waited for news, refreshing our browsers every 30 seconds. Over the rest of the afternoon, the story changed. The pilot was killed. All passengers survived. Some were hospitalised. Camille has the story and photos on his Koh Samui Blog.

The same night my wife took her friend to Phuket airport to fly to Bangkok and it was raining pretty heavily, so we were all a bit nervous.

The last few days in Phuket have seen plenty of sun, a little rain and some strong winds. Rained quite a lot on Tuesday evening, which happened to be the start of a local fair in Kathu village close to our house. I can hear the "live karaoke challenge" as I write! Always seems to rain when they hold this fair which makes conditions underfoot less than pleasant as it's held in a large open field.

This year something a bit special in Kathu. Yesterday started a 3 day event in the village with processions, foodstalls and lots of information booths with information about the history of this area of Phuket. The sky was dark at 5:30pm as the procession was due to start yesterday. Seemed like the whole village was there and all praying that it would not rain. Prayers answered. Some great make-up and costumes, lots of fun, a very happy local gathering. There were lots of people taking photos and also a TV news crew, and not a single foreigner except me. I will blog the event later. A few photos...

May well visit the village tomorrow too, the last day. Lots of food stalls along the road and information about local history. Last night the school band played. The wind did blow, the dark clouds did gather, but the rain did NOT fall!

Sun, sun and sun. This is low season?

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 13:47:00 +0000

As my wife asked this afternoon... "Is this really low season?". The whole week has been sunny. Was there any rain. Not that I recall, maybe some isolated patches of drizzle. Maybe some in the night, but the days have been great. So maybe the "Summer in Phuket" marketing campaign is not so silly as some people think. Personally, I have always liked July. Plenty of good weather. My parents visited from the UK in July several times and the weather very rarely stopped us doing what we wanted. if you look at the rainfall averages, you can see that July is the driest of the low season months, not much wetter than November which is officially high season. You can check the weather reports from July 2006 - 2009 on the blog archives (link on the left of the page).

After work on Wednesday, I drove into Phuket town to see the Phuket Flower Fair being held at Sapan Hin. Some amazing orchids on display / for sale, as well as plenty of other plants. Tomorrow is the last day if you want to see it.
I was surprised at how many people were there on a weekday evening. There are a lot of keen gardeners in Phuket! We like to have lots of different flowers, especially orchids, in our garden.

On Thursday, after another sunny day (a bit windy mind you, good for sailing, but likely to upset some stomachs on boat trips), we had a little meeting in the evening of the Phuket photo group, some of the people who took part in the Phuket photo walk 2 weeks ago.. just an informal gathering, people showing some of their favourite photos, get to know each other. Always interesting and educational to see what photos other people take. Everyone finds their own angle and I like to get ideas from other people's photos. We might do another photo walk in the near future.

Yesterday, another hot day. I strapped on my Reeboks for the first time in weeks (yes I am a lazy fat panda) and went for a run/jog/oh-my-god-my-lungs-are-burning in the evening. So felt less guilty about chugging some beers later.

Today, Saturday. My day off. Lovely day again. I have some sunburn. Red face, neck and arms. Neck especially as I had a haircut in the morning. The local barbers charges 80 Baht for a haircut. Good deal. We then met some friends and headed for a place called Bang Rong on the northeast coast of Phuket. We've been many times to eat at a small restaurant floating in the mangroves. We had seen that they have kayaks for rent at the restaurant, either to paddle yourself or they can provide a paddler for you. So today we decided to get some kayaks! Will be blogged soon... and we'll do it again soon. Only 150 Baht for a kayak, extra 50 Baht to get someone to paddle for you. It was heading towards low tide - would be better at high tide to be able to follow some of the side channels. We were out for about 45 minutes and everyone enjoyed the experience...

Ah yes, a fun day...

My face is burning from too much sun today. Ah yes, the low season. Do I have to say it again? Sure, you might get some rain.. you might be unlucky, but most of the time, I LOVE this time of year in Phuket. See you soon la.

Oh, and RIP Bobby Robson.

And please stop raining in Birmingham so we can whoop the Aussies.

Sunny Birthday Weather

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 11:50:00 +0000

A very happy birthday to my little girl, 8 years old on Friday. A turning point in terms of presents. No Barbies this year, but a CD player with some bedtime story CD's (and I am sure she'll be borrowing my Norah Jones too) and a mobile phone. Too young? Well, we won't be topping up the credit, and she can really only call Mummy and Daddy. It's more for peace of mind and to make her feel like a big girl.

Thursday had been wet, and Thursday night really wet. I went to Phuket Brewery for a few beers with another long term Phuket resident. In fact he's been here 14 years and it turns out lives in the next street to me.. and we'd never met until Thursday! The rain hammered on the roof as we chatted. The Phuket Gazette reported a mudslide which blocked part of the road between Patong and Karon beaches.

Since we had a birthday party planned for Friday afternoon, this wet weather was not welcome at all. So I had a word with Mother Nature, God, Pacha Mama and Thor and we arranged for Friday to be a glorious sunny day. Thanks guys, I owe you one. Aside from a few gusts of wind blowing paper plates around, weather was perfect for a party. And a few more beers. Last to leave was my Aussie friend whose kids are in the same school as ours. But I reckon he was more drunk than me... I woke nearly midday on Saturday and cracked open a beer from the icebox left over from Friday. Can't remember the last time I had a "breakfast beer"! Saturday was another beautiful day.

Having been a Twitter user for a while, I finally decided to login to Twitpic. If you are a Twit, you can join too. The photo of the sky over our house yesterday was the first thing I "twitted"? "twitpicked"? Anyways, will surely add some more... Jamie on TwitPic. Indeed have added a photo of this weeks Phuket Gazette, as they printed a photo I took during last weeks Phuket Photo Walk.

Sunday (today) has also been sunny. Just as I was leaving work, my wife called to suggest I came along to the Phuket Flower Fair at Sapan Hin in Phuket Town, but it was getting late for photos and the place was absolutely packed. I could not find a parking space, and with the light fading I decided to head home.. will check out the flower fair tomorrow or Tuesday. It's on until August 2nd, flower lovers!

A bit wetter in Phuket

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 08:44:00 +0000

We've now had a few grey days again. A typical low season pattern is developing - a few nice days, a few "less nice" days and back to nice. I hope it will be back to nice tomorrow afternoon as we'll be having a party for my daughters 8th birthday. 8 years. Wow. 8 years since she was born, not in Phuket but in Chumphon, my wife's home town. 8 years ago today I know exactly where I was. At the time I worked as a freelance dive instructor, and freelancers tend to say yes to anything! I'd been offered a decent payment to teach a night dive specialty course to 2 people. We had already been on the 22nd, on a longtail boat from Patong. It was a bit bouncy as I recall and one of the students was seasick. I had intended to do 2 dives on the first night, but we only managed 1. So on the 23rd July 2001 we headed out again in the longtail. It was less rough, we did the 2 dives needed to complete the course, I think the 2 students enjoyed it, but taking the work did mean I would miss the actual birth of my daughter. I took the bus to Chumphon next morning and arrived a couple of hours after she was born. Happiest moment of my life.

Just thought I'd share that with you. Take your mind off the grey and wet weather.

Not seen much sun since Saturday. Yesterday there was meant to be a partial eclipse of the sun visible from Phuket. In fact the sun was totally eclipsed. By clouds. In some parts of Asia there was a total eclipse - see BBC Report.

Despite the grey weather, the dive shop has been busy. 3 different dive courses at the same time this week. Another customer came to book a day trip. His non diving wife was with him and started talking about a website she'd been reading about Phuket, written by a foreign guy who's been here for a long time, has got 2 kids and who recommends that people check out Sunrise Divers for their dive trips. Er, I think you mean my website? She was quite a fan. Thank you for that, made my day!

I thought about taking a photo of a grey sky over the beach this morning, but did not want to get my camera wet. It's dry this afternoon with a hint of sun appearing. For the latest Phuket weather conditions look at the links on the left side - radar, webcam, weather station.

Getting Better All The Time

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 13:18:00 +0000

Seems like quite a few days since an update here.. Blame it on the weather and my poor health. I've NOT has swine flu but have had one of those colds that sneakily moves around from sinuses to chest to head to throat. Nothing too debilitating, but I had a week of no beers, lots of tea and Tiffy, early nights.. except I did stay up a bit late watching the Ashes. The weather towards the end of last week was unspectacular. No heavy rain, but not much sun on Thursday and Friday. Nothing to spoil your day, but nevertheless rather grey and unfriendly. There was sporadic rain on Thursday, none that I recall on Friday, but the wind was quite strong. We had a couple of seasick customers who were out on dive trips on Thursday.

The weather slowly improved from Thursday to Saturday and so did I! Saturday morning was bright and sunny, some cloud, but a very nice morning for the Phuket Photo Walk, part of a worldwide photo walk in 900 towns and cities. A very enjoyable morning. I'll write more about the walk on Jamie's Phuket next week. With reference to this blog, the important fact is that the weather was good. I ended up with about 40 photos that are not bad... a taster...

Some more photos now on my Flickr page... I had forgotten about Flickr, had not uploaded any photos for more than 2 years until yesterday!

Oh, today (Sunday) was a very nice sunny day. And even better, England are going to win the 2nd Ashes test! See you next week...

Phuket Rainfall Averages

jjjjmonk@yahoo.co.uk (Jamie Monk in Phuket) — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 04:43:00 +0000

You'll find Phuket weather averages on many websites - rainfall, temperature... and the data seems about right to me, but I never see any mention of where the data comes from, where it was measured exactly or what years it is based on. So I was happy to find a Danish guy living in Patong who has been measuring the rainfall since 1998. Every day. Thank you very much to Steen for sending me his data for the last 11 years. He says he's using a rain measuring gauge called Rain-o-Matic made by a company called Pronamic. Now, of course there can be variation in rainfall around Phuket. Showers and thunderstorms can be very isolated. It can rain in Karon Beach, not in Patong. It can rain in Patong, but not 5km over the hill in Kathu where I live. BUT given 11 years worth of data, things should average out pretty well!

Rainfall Averages for Phuket 1998 - 2009

What can we learn from this? Well, it does agree with most other averages I have seen. I am surprised to see October as the wettest month... but then again an average October can see some heavy rain early in the month, and then as the SW monsoon winds disappear you get some heavy thunderstorms later in the month which last only an hour but can be very heavy. There IS plenty of sun in October too, and later in the month the seas are often calm and the main diving season really gets going.

Best months - well, sure December - February. The data from Steen shows 3 years (2002, 2005 and 2006) with no recorded rain in February. December varies from 2mm in 1999 up to 131mm in 2004. But on average these 3 months are the best for a hot sunny Phuket holiday. March gets a bit wetter, but can vary wildly - from 6mm in 2004 up to 249mm in 2001. Mostly this will be brief heavy thunderstorms, as March is a very hot month. You don't get much in the way of wind or bad weather. A one hour thunderstorm on a hot day can be a good thing! April is a very hot month and again gets thunderstorms, but the seasons can start to change in late April.

May is the start of the "wet season" and you often get more rain, as is shown. But I think it is clear that June and July are not too bad for a summer holiday. This year has seen the driest June (50mm rain) since Steen started measuring data. Wettest was 2006 (over 400mm!). August looks surprisingly wet too, but again a lot of variance over the years ranging from just 89mm of rain in 2005 up to over 500mm in 2000. September I thought was the wettest month. I think compared to October, September is not as nice - you will still get wind and waves due to SW monsoon winds, which then die out in October.

How many days does it rain?

Well, how do you define a rainy day? I would say there are very few "rainy days" in Phuket at any time of year. I would call it a rainy day if the rain falls for long periods, skies are grey and the weather forces you to change your plans. The kind of day when you crack open a beer at the hotel bar at 10am and think glum thoughts.

Well, the graph below shows the average number of days that recorded "some rain". Could be 2mm, could be 100mm in a day. As I say, many days have just short bursts of rain and are still what you'd call a "nice day"!

Even taking into account what I just said about short bursts of rain and isolated thunderstorms, you can see that the "low season" summer months from May - August have totally dry days more than 50% of the time. I keep telling people that the summer is not a bad time to come! From December to March, very few rainy days. Again, plenty of yearly variance - the month of June 2009 saw only 7 days with any kind of rain, the same as in February 2006. In 2008 there were only 120 days in the whole year with some rainfall, compared to a high of 171 days in 2000.

Oh, the weather is such a fickle friend! You can come to Phuket in January and still get rained on. You can come in a "wet" month and have great weather. Following averages does not mean 100% that the weather will be better in March compared to July. A good chance, sure, but for example March this year saw over 180mm of rain.. in 2008 only 15mm was measured in March. So I say this... don't worry too much about the weather!