It was pretty windy last night. We’re used to the wind here and it is quite often windier than you can imagine but it’s been so long since we’ve had any proper wind that it actually kept us a wake last night.
According to the Borth and Ynyslas Weather Station it hit 46.9 knots which is the biggest gust so far this year. Still quite a way off the 62.2 knots recorded on 12th Mar 2008. It’s nice having the weather station there so that I can check these stats and historic records from time to time.
I should really go windsurfing this morning to make the most of the wind that’s left, but I hurt my ribs whilst windsurfing yesterday and don’t think I’ll be able to manage it. The wind is beginning to ease a little now, once it’s dropped off properly my next job will be to get out in the garden and and check the damage done.
It looks as though summer is here, if only for the weekend. Yesterday was hot and sunny with a light NE breeze in the morning and then a NW seabreeze in the afternoon.
Not quite enough wind for windsurfing – even with big kit – so I had a nice MTB ride around the Summit Trail at Nant yr Arian with Andrew in the morning. This was followed by a quick dip in the lake at Pendam which wasn’t as cold as we had expected.
Anna and Morgan headed off to a cinema party in the afternoon whilst I tidied up a bit and pottered in the garden and all of this was followed with the obligatory BBQ in the garden with Dave and Sarah later in the day.
The temperature hit 24.2ºC yesterday, the hottest day of the year so far according to the weather station. It is already 17ºC today and it isn’t even 8am yet. Looks as though it is set to be another scorcher. If it continues like this we’ll be moaning that it’s too hot before long!
What a weekend. Lots of DIY on Saturday for me so our new ensuite shower-room is just about finished. This meant I could reward myself with a windsurf session on Sunday. Simon and I had a pretty mad sail in the estuary. The weather station was recording gusts of 50 knots.
It was just about perfect with my 4m sail, but not quite windy enough in the lulls. The worst / best part was the rain. When the squalls came through it was complete white-out conditions and sailing along at 30 knots without being able to see anything becomes quite a challenge. It was good fun though!
I did have a bit of a problem when packing up though. The back door on my car decided to jam itself stuck. I did manage to get thing shome, but I can’t open the door and much of my windsurfing kit is now stuck in the car.
It was nice to be able to come back, straight into the beach room and into the new shower though.
The wind continued to blow all evening meaning that we couldn’t hear the TV over the wind outside. It is kind of funny sitting in the living room barely able to talk to each other because of the noise of the wind and rain.
I love living here when the weather is wild.
What lovely weather we’re having at the moment. Here’s the general view from our window over the past few days.
Rain through the window
According to the weather station we’ve had over 10cm of rain so far this month.
Looks as though the weekend ahead should be a scorcher. It hit 24.5ºC here today according to the weather station and looks set to continue throughout the weekend.
Still not sure if there will be a katabatic wind in the morning though, so I’m not sure if I’ll be able to go windsurfing, but I should be able to fit in a bike ride and some playing in the canoe and on the beach with Morgan. Maybe even another BBQ.
So, what have you got planned for the weekend?
It’s been a record breaking week as far as the Borth and Ynyslas weather station goes this week. We have recorded both the deepest low pressure with a pressure reading of 953.9mb on March 1oth and the windiest day with a maximum gust of 62.2 knots at 1.42am this morning… Both records since the weather station began recording in 2005.
Thankfully, other than a few bins and bits of garden furniture being blown all over the place we have escaped any damage from the winds. Mind you, visiting the portaloo at 3am this morning was an adventure in itself!
The Borth and Ynyslas Weather Station is now back online again.
We had some problems with it in December. First the temperature and humidity sensor stopped functioning properly. A replacement was ordered, but when installed it fried the main SIM board within the sensor suite and everything stopped working properly. I have since got a brand new SIM board and a new temperature and humidity sensor and spent yesterday morning up the telegraph pole installing the new components and getting everything working.
Once the new SIM board was successfully talking to the console I powered up the PC and got it doing its thing, manipulating the raw data and uploading it very minute to the live online display. The data logger still had a few rogue readings stored in it so I had to manually remove some of these data points but it all seems fine now and the live data is once again available online.
Here in Wales and elsewhere in the UK we are all obsessed with the weather… Even a quick read through this weblog will prove this as there seems to be quite a few references to what the weather has been up to. Maybe its because we are quite exposed here and really feel the full force of the weather, but whatever the reason it is certainly the hot topic of the day almost everyday.
Of course, I am probably more obsessed with the weather than most as my passions of windsurfing, kitesurfing and surfing depend heavily on what the wind and surf is up to, so I always have an eye on the weather. Many of the people who regularly visit my Forces-of-Nature coastal sports website are similarly obsessed with the weather, but are not so fortunate to live here where the action is. Because of this Forces-of-Nature will soon be adding a new ‘Live Weather Station’ to the list of online services it offers. As you can see from the photo I have been up a telegraph pole setting the weather station up. It will take me a while to get the website side of things up and running as I first need to source and set-up a PC dedicated to running the weather station which can sit in a corner somewhere crunching the data received from the sensors and uploading it to the internet.
I’m hoping to go live with the Borth and Ynyslas Weather Station in the next 4-6 weeks. When it does go live the weather station pages will offer up to the minute live data on wind direction, wind speed, temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, rainfall and various other weather parameters. In addition to the live weather data I’m also hoping to provide data on weather extremes (daily, monthly and yearly maximums and minimums), trends (over various timescales) and various graphs and charts based on the data collected by the weather station. Once established the weather station should be useful for people living in or visiting the Aberystwyth area or anywhere along the coast of Cardigan Bay.
I’ll keep you posted with the progress, and hopefully I won’t have to go up that telegraph pole again for a while!!
