The First Day of Summer?

It was a stunning day yesterday. You could tell at 6.45am when the curtains were pulled back that it was going to be really nice as there was that familiar orange glow over the Med.

I wandered down into the ‘jungle’ to cut down another square metre of prickly bushes and had to take my sweater off because it was so warm. At lunch, I could have sat on the terrace, but didn’t, and the pool even looked inviting despite the temperature only rising over the last few days to a positively blood-chilling 12 degrees.

I have to say it’s strange to see the sun shining in the sky when there are no leaves on the trees and the only flowers in the ground which are blooming are the daffodils and the violets. The weather has been gradually getting more settled over the last couple of weeks and old, more preferable habits are coming back.

It’s nice to get up in the morning and it’s light. It’s nice not to have to put on all-weather clothes when I take my scooter out. It’s nice to be able to hang the washing on the line and it’s good for my bank balance not to have to put on the central heating every day.

The town centres are busy again with people sitting outside in the open-air cafés and convertible cars have their roofs down. Girls have got their sunglasses on, the kids are playing football in the village square and everything just seems a bit more positive.

However, and it’s a big however. Look at the photo above. It was taken on the 6^th March a couple of years ago and shows that even in this spring like weather the snow can fall and take you unawares although with my ‘new’ satellite mapping web site, it shouldn’t now take us by surprise – we could see it coming.

My old French neighbour still has his frost protecting nets over his lemon trees so in theory we could get another cold snap but let’s hope that the Cote d’Azur weather has now changed for the good and this is the start of the nice weather.