Which places' climates do you think people have the most mistaken impressions of? (snowy, hot)

[Stumbler.]

I was wondering about this. Of course, we often get our impressions on climates sometimes from media depictions, which might included travel posters, reputation, associations with lifestyles and appearance of vegetation, even before we learn to read climate stats. Sometimes the impressions might be wrong.

For instance, someone assuming coastal southern California is hotter than it actually is, in the summer based on the beach culture and palm trees, not realizing some of the summer highs are in the 70s F or even lower.

Also, I don't know how many people assume Britain is snowier than it actually is, based on postcard depictions of Christmas etc. though I'm guessing most people are aware of the oceanic nature of western European climes now (in fact, the "Gulf stream makes Europe extra mild" is practically a cliche now).

Some people also seem to have the mistaken idea that Canadian cities like Toronto, even in summer, or Vancouver, are very cold because of a vague association of anything on the Canadian side of the border is "very cold", even compared to something like Detroit or Minneapolis (of course, many people do realize that Canada does contain a major area of land south of the 49th parallel).

Some reputations (eg. Chicago as the windy city -- though I've heard conflicting ideas on how the nickname came about) aren't lived up to as strongly, even when they feature in a popular description of a climate.

Although most people with a little knowledge or real world experience might not make these mistakes, but I'm sure many of us even were a little surprised to read examples of cities/places whose stats didn't live up to their reputation of how much they are hot, cold, sunny, cloudy, wet, dry etc.

On example of a misconception I had was thinking New Zealand was more tropical-like in summer than it actually is, because as a kid I saw too many images of it along with rainforest/tropical-looking vegetation on posters and in books and emphasizing it's exotic nature, I practically assumed it was tropical just like the Amazon rainforest or something, when I was young. Of course, now I know better.

Of course, some climate misconceptions depend a lot on where you live and grew up. I notice people from cold or 4-season continental climates often lump together a lot of places as similar just because they have mild winters or "no winter" and are therefore warm (eg. I think there are some people in cold climates who'd think southern California, Mexico city, and Singapore vaguely belong in some category like that). Also I notice the reverse -- people from hot climates having a vague notion of places with "cold climates" being anywhere from Anchorage to New York city or something! Some people might not realize that a cool summer can go hand in hand with a warm winter (eg. southern California) or a hot summer can go hand in hand with a cool or cold winter (eg. the Great Plains).

[wawa1992]

Coastal Florida. People say it's flaming hot year-round. Actually, when I went to Panama City in late May, the temperatures were in the mid-80s - but the sea breeze made it feel good. And I'm not a heat person.

[deneb78]

I think people think have the wrong impression of Vancouver that it rains all the time here.. (this year being the exception).. our summers tend to be quite dry and sunny on the whole albeit a bit cool.

[B87]

Northern Italy has cold, snowy winters and Milan is one of the foggiest cities in Europe. Most people think of Italy as being warm/hot and sunny all year round.

I've never heard of Britain being thought of as snowy. Most people think it rains all the time or that it's always foggy which simply isn't true at all; London is one of the driest capital cities in Europe and has fewer wet days than Sydney (another place that is mistakenly believed to always be hot and sunny). London is probably one of the least foggy major cities in the world (during the height of coal induced smogs, London averaged around 40-50 foggy days per year, nowdays Heathrow probably gets less than 15 fog days per year).

Most people in the UK think coastal California is hot, when it's barely if at all warmer than southern England in the summer. Also the water temps off CA in summer are pretty similar to the south coast in the summer.

[wawa1992]

Originally Posted by deneb78

I think people think have the wrong impression of Vancouver that it rains all the time here.. (this year being the exception).. our summers tend to be quite dry and sunny on the whole albeit a bit cool.

You'd love Tennessee... it's been hot this year (95 F on May 26th), albeit wetter than normal.

[ben86]

I once had an Italian tell me he didn't think many people lived in the north of England because it was too cold (even though Milan has a colder January than Manchester and large parts of inland Italy get much more snow than us!) and who imagined it to be largely glaciers and boreal forest, while similarly the first time I went to France and I commented on how warm the record-breaking heatwave going on over there felt to me I had somebody ask me what the winters were like back home in Yorkshire - when I said it wasn't actually that cold, typically plus four or five (C), their response was "Don't you mean minus five?"

[Patricius Maximus]

The biggest misconception would have to be Chicago and its purported "brutal winters" that only feature 8 nights per year that are below zero. The way people talk up the brutal cold I'd expect it to average -40F instead of +20F. They don't get all that much snow, either, and Chicago isn't particularly windy nor does it get much wind off the lake.

Another big misconception is Seattle being this über-rainy climate when in fact it doesn't get much rain, though it has a respectable number of rainy days in winter, but certainly less than its reputation suggests. It also has a reputation for being cloudy all the time, even though it isn't that cloudy in winter and summers feature endless sunshine. The rainy part of the reputation, however, is true for the immediate coast of Washington and Oregon.

The Great Lakes have a reputation for being cloudy as well but those places are actually quite sunny, and are rather even-tempered when it comes to the balance of sun vs. clouds. The only reason I can think of for this misconception is the fact that the rest of the States are even sunnier. In their favor Detroit is rather cloudy in winter (80 sun hours) but that's it - summers are quite sunny. You can look at YouTube videos of TWC local forecasts from nearby Lansing (socool775's channel) over the years and you can see that the place has no shortage of sunshine (most of the time).

There is another misconception of interior Alaska and other parts of the Canadian Subarctic being cold year-round when that isn't the case. True, they're cold in winter, usually bitterly cold, but they warm up to respectable levels of warmth in summer and can sometimes feature temperatures up to 90F.

Another place that has a reputation for being cold all the time is San Francisco. 50's in winter warming up to 70's in summer hardly strikes me as cold, even with fog, and fog dense enough to cause that sort of dampness isn't as common as it's made out to be. SF features year-round warmth, not year-round cold.

The last misconception would have to be deserts that cool off greatly at night. The fact is that hot deserts are furnaces at night in the summer, mostly not dropping below 80F, as is the case in Arizona. There are deserts that do cool off at night in Nevada but these are more the exception than the rule.

[dunno what to put here]

I once told my friend from Rochester, NY that England is not snowy, he was surprised. I think England is more though of as being rainy but due to the old frost fairs in London, and all the stories of London at Christmas with snow, and all the movies, people may think the UK is snowier than it really is.

[Weatherfan2]

Originally Posted by ben86

I once had an Italian tell me he didn't think many people lived in the north of England because it was too cold (even though Milan has a colder January than Manchester and large parts of inland Italy get much more snow than us!)

He was right. Only the most insane, irrational, mentally disturbed people could possible want to live in Northern England. It explains a lot from what I've seen as a southerner who now lives half way to the north. Not to mention the inbreeding. I mean seriously why anybody would choose to live with such little sun and warmth and endless rain all year round is totally beyond me. When I arrived here in 2003 (not due to weather related reasons OBVIOUSLY...) I thought 2003 was just an average summer, still not quite as good as the usual Berkshire summer I was used to, and thought "maybe the weather isn't so bad here after-all". UNTIL I saw what "normal summers" are like here!!

Also don't forget that all of Italy apart from the highest mountains gets nice warm summers. I've been to highland northern Italy in summer and it was very warm and sunny.

[dunno what to put here]

It's not that hard to move from one end of the country to the other, so just hurry up and leave, go back down to your congested hellhole known as South East England, which, coincidentally, is wetter and cloudier so far than northern England.