Weather Permitting – Climatic Events in Cornwall (Cornwall Chronicles #8)

The first and last thing I noticed while in Cornwall was the weather. The weather was just as alive and real as the Cornish people who inhabit the southwestern corner of Great Britain. The weather was just as much an experience as any visit to one of Cornwall's famous beaches or medieval castles. The weather welcomed and repelled in unequal measure depending upon the hour.?I use the term hour, instead of day, because the weather changes without notice. Describing Cornwall's weather as capricious does not quite do it justice. The same goes for the British Isles as a whole. In northeastern Ohio, which I now call home, there is a saying, "if you don't like the weather, just wait 15 minutes and it will change." In Cornwall and the rest of the British Isles, the weather is an up to the minute drama. It accompanied me wherever I went. The weather was a harsh taskmaster, micromanaging my interactions with Cornwall. There was no escaping it.

Changing Nature – The Perpetual Forecast

I received the full weather experience multiple times, often within the same hour, during my weeklong stay in Cornwall. There would be stormy skies, but no rain. There would be partly sunny skies with rain. There was mist, drizzle, and downpours. On the day I visited Restormel Castle, a steady rain turned into a complete drenching. The day could not have been drearier, but this soon changed. After visiting a teahouse in the village of Minions, the rain had changed to intermittent showers. Less than an hour later, I surmounted Launceston Castle and there was nary a drop. By the time I returned to Truro, the sun had broken through the clouds.?From anecdotal evidence based on my personal experience, I would say the weather changes three or four times a day on average.

It was no surprise that the weather had changed radically by the next day. Starting off, the weather was pleasant on my half hour walk to the city center in Truro. A surprisingly sunny day was underway. The forecast had been for rain the entire week, but it certainly did not look that way. I went into a bookshop and by the time I came out half an hour later, a rain shower was in progress. This only lasted a few minutes. Clouds soon covered the sky.?Later that same day when I was at St. Catherine’s Castle in Fowey, the sunshine spilled through the clouds and added splashes of silver as it shone down on the ocean. The temperature climbed. It was so warm that I soon started sweating. The weather in Fowey was close to perfect. This would not last. By the time I returned to Truro in the late afternoon, the wind was howling, and the temperature plummeting. This was just another typical day of weather in the British Isles.

Weather Or Not – A Source of Indifference

My father figure who was English gave me insight on the British mindset regarding the weather. I assumed that in a place where the weather is such a part of life that it would be a continuous source of fascination. My friend had a strangely matter-of-fact attitude about the weather in his homeland. Rain was as common as sunshine and clouds the norm. He found the American obsession with the weather bizarre. The Weather Channel was a subject of derision. He found it ridiculous and wondered why anyone cared. I asked him if the weather was a point of discussion during his time in Britain. He just shrugged. There was no need for a forecast because it rained so frequently. The more I visit Britain, the more his opinion makes sense to me. It is either getting ready to rain, already is raining, or it just finished raining. If none of these three are taking place, then clouds are building in the sky and will soon be threatening rain. Of course, those who have experienced periodic flooding or nasty storms coming inland from the ocean would beg to differ.

I imagine that a major weather event in Britain would be defined as a prolonged period of sunny skies and hotter than normal temperatures. Even with climate change where average temperatures in Britain might go up a couple of degrees, this would still make it mild by the standards of what other places might suffer. The climate is temperate in the extreme. There is perpetually bad, but tolerable weather. This pleasant paradox is something the inhabitants of the British Isles have learned to live with. They have no choice except to make the best of something most others would consider quite bad.

A week without rain in Cornwall might be enough to declare a major drought. That is an exaggeration, but for an American the lack of truly terrible weather in Britain makes it rather unique. As my English friend once told me, they do not have the kind of cataclysmic weather events that the United States frequently suffers. The lack of climatic extremes that lead to hurricanes and tornadoes makes Britain a rather pleasant place to live. All you really need is a good raincoat and the ability to blithely ignore the obvious.

Stormy Skies – The Daily Forecast

To a foreigner the weather in Great Britain was a constant source of wonder. I saw the British tolerance for the weather filtered through my Hungarian friends who were transplants to Cornwall. It was something they had learned to take in stride. The only thing they noted was that one time a few flakes of snow had fallen. A truly incredible event in Cornwall where the rain never quite goes away. Right before I left, they did note the forecast for the rest of the week. Telling me that it was supposed to rain.

Just before my final departure at the train station in Truro, the skies were gloomy. Rain looked imminent. No such thing happened. The train out of Cornwall was shrouded in perpetual gloom. At any moment I expected to see raindrops forming on the window. There was not a drop of rain across Devon or along the way to my destination north of London. The forecast had called for a 90% chance of rain that day. It never happened, but I am sure the next storm is not far away. ?