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Old 06-29-2014, 09:25 AM
 
Location: Duluth, MN
428 posts, read 810,032 times
Reputation: 240

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So a concern of people like me thinking of moving to Portland is the doom and gloom overcast skies during much of the year. So i did some digging and found historical averages for NOAA hourly cloud cover during the year in Portland (portland airport data), raw data, and thought I would post it here in case it has not been posted on this forum before. I would also be interested to know if locals think it looks realistic over say a ten year period average.
http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/pqr/pdxclimate/pg117.pdf

For me, currently living in Duluth MN, the data actually does not look so bad. Here I am trapped inside my house, car, bookstore six months out of the year because of brutal cold and snowy winter; Cold overcast gloomy October then winter here Nov-April. so that leaves Mar-Sept to be concerned about for moving to pdx, and from what I hear most agree Portland is pretty darn nice July-Sept. So to compare apples to apples I need to really look at May and June, two months. And from the charts on hourly cloud cover it looks like some of the days are often broken clouds (some sun) to partly cloudy and even sometimes clear-- does that sound realistic at least for May and June? For someone moving to Portland from a much sunnier milder climate a comparison is much different than what I am used to coming from a harsh snowy long winter climate with lots of cloud coverage even during non-winter months. I am looking to escape snow and ice which is six months here in northern M-- and i will easily trade snow, ice, shoveling mountains of snow, scraping and chopping ice, for gloomy skies (we have during winter anyhow here) and drizzly rain in Portland for those six months of our winter (and then after six months of winter here Nov-April we have rain and gloomy skies another 1-2 months during 'Spring').
Attached Thumbnails
gloomy skies: cloud cover raw data -- realistic?-pdx-cloudcover.jpg  
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Old 06-29-2014, 11:54 AM
 
Location: Portland
1,620 posts, read 2,299,955 times
Reputation: 1986
To me, there is a big difference between a day of (sometimes beautiful) high clouded skies and a day of "doom and gloom" low clouded skies. I've only lived here two years and it seems there are more of the former than the latter, but the very short days in the winter do exacerbate the issue.

Coming from MN you will be more apt to adjust than someone from say CA who I find to do most of the whining about the weather. Good luck whatever you choose.....
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Old 06-29-2014, 12:06 PM
 
Location: Duluth, MN
428 posts, read 810,032 times
Reputation: 240
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sherwoody View Post
....Coming from MN you will be more apt to adjust than someone from say CA who I find to do most of the whining about the weather. Good luck whatever you choose.....
I think so. I mean winter here (northern MN)-- sunrise around 8am and it is dark black at 4:30pm at the winter solstice, just not much sunlight regardless of cloud cover! Plus (and perhaps I am the first to coin this term, but I doubt I am the first-- I am researching being a 'rainbird', viz live in Portland and then during the rainy winter season just get the heck away somewhere warm and sunny for 2-3 months, a nice break from the cold rain. Somewhere like Orlando, Las Vegas, Hawaii; rent a home/condo, rent a car, do some fun stuff. Similar to snowbirds who live in MN but disappear to AZ for the winter, then return to MN when summer arrives in June.
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Old 06-29-2014, 12:30 PM
 
Location: Portland
1,620 posts, read 2,299,955 times
Reputation: 1986
You can keep an eye on some webcams. Here are a few but I'm sure there are many more.

http://www.instacam.com/instacamimg/PRTST/PRTST_l.jpg

KGW Metro Cams | kgw.com Portland

KGW Metro Cams | kgw.com Portland

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