Snow report

The snow of a few weeks ago is already a distant memory; it's 13C here in London with 15C forecast as a high. This weather is absolutely crazy; my facebook history feed has a post from the 3rd of December 4 years ago bitching about it being -10C. This year the weather is far warmer than it should be, I've yet to see a frost and even the daffodils are blooming.

So you aren't a climate change denier then, Fwoggie?

Here the sun is shining -- it was just above 0 this morning, although there was no frost. It's really damp though. Forecast for the afternoon is 13°, but of course with the sun shining it feels warmer. No special cold predicted in the next couple of weeks.

Swiss Alps:
snow above 1100 metres in the shade and above 1900 metres on the sunny slopes of Rhone Valley (Crans-Montana, etc.). Many ski lifts will begin to run at the end of this week. The sky is still cloudless (at least until the beginning of next week, according to the weather forecast) and temperatures at noon are around 10 degrees centigrade up to 2000 metres.
The lower (water channel) hiking trails in the Rhone Valley (like Brig - Mund - Eggen - Eggerberg - Ausserberg - Rarnerkumme - Hohtenn - Steg - Gampel - Bratsch - Erschmatt - Feschel - Wiler - Leuk - Varen - Varner Suon - Venthner Suon - Darnona - Tovachir - Bisse de Chermignon et de Lens - St. Leonard - Bisse de Clavau - Grimisuat - Saviese - Sensine - Erde - Magnot - Ardon - Mayens de Chamoson - Ovronnaz - Randonne - Planuit - Tassonieres - Branson - Martigny) are mostly free of snow and can easily be done with the help of some city crampons (for the few short icy legs).
Hiking is fine in Ticino too.
Trails at similar altitudes in the Bernese Oberland etc. are under deep snow.

Crazy Melbourne-region week, ranging from 37° and bushfire, through to -3° and real snow in the mountains. Calmed down now ... pretty steady low thirties and sunny, for the next week it seems.

Yesterday it was warmer than normal here too, but colder than in London and with early morning frost.

Then fog settled in - the low-lying, windless Po valley traps cold air in winter and warm air in summer. The maximum today is 4°C and it feels colder because it's very wet.

The sun is shining in the mountains, above the fog trap; snow has melted under 2000 mt.

Nice day in Sicily...sunny,15°.

And the same again...sunny days,blue skies.

Today is a holiday in Italy.Great to have a Tuesday off!

Its also the day we put up the Christmas Tree....

The North of the UK got seriously trashed earlier this week by Storm Desmond. Winds reached a max of 85mph on the tops of mountains (some 135kmh-ish) which is fairly common for the region at this time of the year so not a big deal. The rainfall however was a big deal; a new UK 24 hour rainfall record was set - 341mm of rain (13.42 inches). This has caused severe flooding to areas which were supposed to have flooding to handle all but the 1 in 100 year storm. The flood defences didn't fail, they were simply overtopped. Directly attributable deaths so far is fortunately low - only 3 to date - but over 5,000 houses have been flooded whilst over 50,000 properties remain without power several days later. London however was barely affected - the Emirates dangleway got suspended for a few hours which caused absolute chaos (I lie, nobody even noticed it was suspended).

Today London is 13C, cloudy, drizzly and dull. Still no sign of winter.

And the same in the Swiss Alps again...sunny days, immaculated blue skies. Day temperatures up to 10 degrees (Rhone Valley), night temperatures around 0 degrees in the midlands and up to 10 degrees below zero in the Engiadina Ota.

It was sunny and 16° earlier in the day but it started to rain a short while ago. It is supposed to get colder tomorrow.