OK that's good at least Gosport is a legit site then.

Is anyone else's internal calendar off-kilter?

With all the hot weather (getting on for about 10 weeks with only brief dips during May), the grass is all yellow/gone, we've had some lovely days out, several BBQ's, countless dips in the hot tub, the farmers are harvesting.

It feels like we've had summer and it'll be winding down into autumn soon.

Yet the kids are still 2/3 weeks from even breaking up for their school holidays and we're still in the first third of July!

Yes, absolutely. The grapes on my garden vine are already swelling and the flowerbeds look like they’re ready for a good autumn cut back.

And I fear nature may continue the pretence by bringing us autumn in time for the school holidays.

Indeed - the synoptics leading to these conditions couldn't hold out forever, and of course every great summer had unsettled blips but the fear is will the settled conditions return? Who knows.. but I know for sure I'd have much rather had the past 6 weeks occur in July and August than May and June. I loathe front-loaded summers.

So much pessimism around today I feel. A breakdown in this weather was inevitable. It was never going to last all the way to the end of August. A week of unsettled weather will be good for everything really, particularly those firefighters on the moors! I'd be happy with a return to settled conditions towards the end of July giving us warm / hot weather for about 3 weeks to about mid-late August. Would like a May style September too as I'm away mid September in the Lakes. Not interestend in exactly how hot it gets.

I've also got Friday - Monday in York this weekend so am hoping we can cling onto this weather until after them. Looking like I should just about be ok.

It is surprisingly cloudy today. Quite dull clouds too. 23C

Couldn't agree with this personally. A fantastic spell of weather that has coincided with the maximum hours of daylight has been a real treat. Dark at 9-00pm is no use if you want to sit in the garden.

and 30.5 on the car thermistor on A27 north of Southampton - but back to 28.5 passing Portsmouth ca 1630

Most places in the world don't get sunsets anywhere near as late as we do - it's not that big of a deal. In Miami, it gets dark before 8:30pm right now. For comparison's sake,those are the kind of sunset times we have in late August.

And you can't deny that a summer starting off nice but finishing on a poor note just leaves a really sour taste in the mouth. 1992 was like that and nobody ever remembers that summer fondly even though June was very nice. If July and August are poor then the summer as a whole will likely be deemed poor - and that's simply because they are (more so August) the primary holiday months.

Not that I remember '76 as I was only 2, but the thing that has really come to the fore this year in my analysis is the consistency of the temps. Living in the countryside, we will never be as hot as the nearest town, Reading, and our hottest temp this hot spell has "only" been 30.6c, with 30.4c yesterday. That said, the last 15 days average max has been 28.7c. Even my wife who's from Melbourne, and is used to 40c+ days, said she can't remember a spell like this back home before she moved here 12 years ago.

That alongside every day being roughly 3c above the MetO predicted max of course, so our "cool" forecast of 22c tomorrow might keep the 25c days going a bit longer.

It is an official station although I have to confess yesterday was the first time I had heard of it. Data available here:

http://www.weathercast.co.uk/world-weather/weather-stations/obsid/99212.html

Today was also looking very hot but the sea breeze kicked in much earlier. Highest hourly maximum was 29.0C at midday which is 1.3C lower than the same time yesterday.

The afternoon here was controlled by large, slow-moving areas of cloud with long slices of clear sky in between.

As of 1:30 pm I feared these clouds were going to prevent the much sought-after (from a stats geek perspective) fourth day in the 30s as it was only 28.5*C and those clouds seemed determined to keep blocking out the sun - but then, by some stroke of luck, a clear slot moved over just before 2 pm and stuck with me for just over an hour with only brief interruptions from smaller higher-level clouds. 

Temps climbed steadily and an area-mean of 30*C looks sufficient for the first 4-day run since 2003.

...or is it? Allowing for 2 decimal places, I find the maximum value to be 29.95*C. I kid you not! 

There's a case to be made for this disallowing the 4-day run, but my personal records have always been to 1 decimal place, so it will be logged as a 4-day run regardless.

I will, however, make a note that it actually fell 5 hundredth of a degree Celsius short at the final hurdle 

I'm beginning think that the end of day stats on the met office website are all automated, and only from stations thay have been included in the set. Perhaps there's a number of other (newer?) sites that they use that have yet to be included in set.

Yes it for to 31.1C early afternoon here in North Portsmouth, but dropped a little afterwards. Despite the breeze it stayed around the 30C mark, however towards the southern half of the city/island that breeze had cool feel to it. When I travel to work around 3.30pm I left home @30C to a much cooler (estimate) 23/24C southsea.

I don't know what it was at 16:30 but an hour earlier it was still 30C - though I suspect areas directly exposed to the breeze would have been cooler even towards the north of the island.

interesting ...I wonder how many on this Forum actually realise Portsmouth is on an Island? 

I did know that but looking at Google Earth, it really is only just, especially at low tide!

I didn't know that, but I have found this Wikipedia article which confirms that Portsmouth is indeed, mostly located on Portsea Island which itself, is right next to to the south coast of mainland England (and indeed, the UK mainland). The fact that this article refers to Portsmouth being MOSTLY located on that island would suggest that there is a still a very small part of it which is on the mainland although I'm sure that anyone who is local to that area will know a lot more about that than me (until now, the only thing I knew about Portsmouth was it was on the south coast of England and had a football team which is nicknamed as the Pompey).

That's very true about sunset times elsewhere - but they're compensated by much higher sun angles which gives a lot more warmth which lingers well into the evenings. Once we get past about 12th August, the evenings cool quite quickly, especially in the north of England, Scotland and NI and the usefulness of our summer evenings fade quite quickly. Don't get me wrong, I like fine weather anytime, but the double bonus of prolonged heat and maximum hours of sun/daylight has been a rare treat.

Incidentally this morning was the first time in a while it felt distinctly chilly.

We all are, matey!

I wonder , Is it anything like Love Island?

I'm fearing it will be normal service resumed up here in the north west from next week. The usual NW / SE split. Lots of rain. Lots of cloud. Blustery winds. Hoping we can get back to that Easterly flow but not feeling very positive about it all at the moment. Probably will have a better idea mid next week. I feel like we are one more settled spell away from a classic summer!

Started off cloudy this morning but cleared by lunch time. Now beautiful blue skies and temperatures at around 24C. Very pleasant.

That already was the case here during late June - the low humidity combined with an often gusty easterly breeze meant that temperatures took a tumble in the evening meaning it was already below 20C before 9pm on many evenings, and a light jacket was often required unless you were in direct sunlight.

The good thing about August here is that easterlies become much less common and that is not often an issue.

in the days when everybody walked to work, everybody and their families lived on Portsea island. Some claim it had the highest density of population of any island in the world, even more than Hong Kong. Then the Luftwaffe demolished much of the city, and postwar planning spread development out on to the mainland, replacing green fields with gargantuan housing estates, some under the control of Portsmouth, some under other local authorities.

Back to temperatures; the heat wave is dead, long live the heat wave.

In this part of the world, it's felt almost as warm today as in past days - no real break.