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The UK climate is one of the most talked about yet least understood climates on the planet, tourists are very often woefully inadequately dressed for the UK, you would be amazed at how for example a tourist would have a totally different wardrobe for visiting London than they would for visiting Paris during the same holiday, I've spoken to holidaymakers who have admitted this to me. I've even had my very own cousin (who is from Sabah) fly to the UK (stayed with my ma) last winter just because she wanted to experience snow! You can imagine how disappointed she was to get cool & grey instead.
Not really. Sunny in the US means blue skies or less than 30% high clouds. But partly cloudy days are also sunny. Denver has very few days with no sun.
Not really. Sunny in the US means blue skies or less than 30% high clouds. But partly cloudy days are also sunny. Denver has very few days with no sun.
So it has 300 days with some sun, not 300 sunny days.
I'm from the San Francisco Bay Area, and people (from other regions) just do NOT understand our weather!! First, they tend to think "California = warm and sunny," forgetting that it's a ginormous state with hundreds of microclimates... especially in the summer, it can literally be 20-30 degrees warmer in San Jose than it is in San Francisco.
They don't realize just how much the coastal fog and wind impacts things, and that it's often COLDEST IN THE SUMMER. We can spot a tourist in the summer by their shorts, sandals, and newly-purchased "I love SF" sweatshirt - which they bought from a street vendor, after freezing off their butt while sightseeing.
Also, as you mentioned, the ocean here is freezing cold. Not to mention we've got sharks, so it's "swim at your own risk." This is how we dress for the beach (actually one of my friends in Pacifica):
San Francisco has some of the coolest summers in the entire US. And yes California south to north spans massive distance. San Diego is about the same latitude as Dallas/Fort Worth, while Crescent City is equal latitude as Martha's Vineyard, Chicago, and Point Pelee(southernmost point of Canada). Add in some mountains and you get regions in northern California that are as snowy as much of the Upper Midwest. Squaw Valley hosted the Winter Games in 1960, and nearby Truckee often competes with Lake of the Woods, Minnesota and Saranac Lake, New York for the title of national low temperature during many days in the spring and summer.
1. People, usually Americans, equate Canada = Disney's Frozen. They tend to not know that Canadian summers are actually hot and humid.
2. Conversely, Canadians assume that places like Texas are hot and humid year round. They have hard time imagining that Texas actually has beautiful weather 7 months of the year.
2. People in Southern half of the US do not know what real winter brings. They tend to either over-estimate or under-estimate the cold and the snowy conditions. When I was back in Texas, my friends would say something like "Oh, the winter in Canada is actually not that bad. It's really the cold waves that will get to you. It comes and goes. I was there for like 5 days. it wasn't that bad." Now that I live in Canada, if I could, I really wanna tell that friend "You had no idea what the hell you were talking about."
I know that when I was a kid I used to think that all of Mexico was one big arid desert, I then was surprised that Mexico had jungles in the south. Then sometime after that I was surprised that Mexico city was a highland subtropical climate where it's in the 70s and low 80s all year round. Also similar thing with Bogota, since it's in Columbia I thought it would be a hot tropical climate but it's in the 60s all year round.
Absolute rubbish, I think people get it the other way round. You are only comparing your climate to the rest of California. True, it has cooler summers. But if you compare it to the rest of the world e.g UK, San Francisco's climate is very good.
It is true that some days in winter can be warmer than summer. It might be 23°C (73°F) on a February day and then only 19°C (66°F) on a July day. Normally however, Autumn is the warmest time of year and winter the coldest, and summer is normally warmer than winter.
It might be quite warm at the moment, but that's only because of the Jet Stream. It's actually quite weird because the past couple of Decembers it has been almost the same temperature or even warmer where I live in England as it has been in SF, in December 2015, the mean temperature in SF was 10.4°C, whereas where I live in England it was 11.0°C.
However this December has been very different in both locations. The other day SF reached 22°C (72°F), whereas I have only reached 2°C (36°F) or even lower on a couple of days. It has been much warmer than normal in SF and slightly below here, rather than much warmer than normal here and normal in SF.
SF has over 3,000 hours of sunshine per year. It has more sunny days per year than LA, Miami, Denver, Oklahoma City and San Diego. It also has over 10 hours of sunshine per day in July.
Precisely to the bolded, as I wasn't comparing us to the rest of the world.
The question was regarding misconceptions about YOUR CLIMATE - and it's a fact that people think ALL of California is warm ALL the time! So in comparison to people's expectations, it is rather chilly and unpleasant much of the year (at the coast). Of course it's nicer than the UK, but I also think your stats are skewed regarding sunny days. Have you lived in SF or its surrounding cities? And do you realize even SF itself has a ton of microclimates? You could be in Noe Valley enjoying glorious sunshine, then drive 3 miles to the outer Sunset, and be trapped in pea-soup fog; or drive 3 miles SE to the Bayview, and be blown away by heavy winds. They measure the temps (and sun?) from the middle around Twin Peaks, which is the warmest and sunniest part. So yeah, I'm not convinced.
Also, I forgot to mention how surprised some folks are that it SNOWS in California. I lived in South Lake Tahoe for two winters (El Nino winters, no less), and the snow levels there can be unreal at times. Therefore I repeat: California is not as warm and sunny as people tend to think.
Hmmmm, trust "stats" or someone who actually lives there?
I was in San Francisco in July and she is exactly right. The Bay Area has so many micro climates that you can go from sweating your a$$ off to freezing in a less than 30 minute drive.
She never said the climate wasn't good overall, but it is quite surprising for some people how cool and foggy it can be.
Thank you.
I've lived in the Bay Area for over 30 years, including 5 years in two different parts of San Francisco - also live/d in the north Peninsula, south Bay, and worked in the east Bay for years. So I'm pretty sure I am familiar with our various climates! And as you said (also I did above), I'm only comparing us to people's expectations of CALIFORNIA.
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