Interesting discussion in the last few posts here.  Johncs's contribution in which he identified four areas is a good refinement of the NW/SE split idea when looking at rainfall.  Though I wonder if there is yet more to take account of.  There are other places reporting low rainfall, such as ARTzeman in NE Somerset (see Precip. thread). I haven't got time to investigate, but it might be that it isn't just the extreme SE that has been very dry - other parts south of the M4 (that well-known boundary for weather conditions ) might be also. I have a suspicion that in the far south, from Cornwall to Kent, the variations in rainfall come from the fact that it has come in heavy showers which deliver the rain in a hit-and-miss fashion, leading to a very unsystematic distribution across the area.

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Interesting discussion in the last few posts here.  Johncs's contribution in which he identified four areas is a good refinement of the NW/SE split idea when looking at rainfall.  Though I wonder if there is yet more to take account of.  There are other places reporting low rainfall, such as ARTzeman in NE Somerset (see Precip. thread). I haven't got time to investigate, but it might be that it isn't just the extreme SE that has been very dry - other parts south of the M4 (that well-known boundary for weather conditions ) might be also. I have a suspicion that in the far south, from Cornwall to Kent, the variations in rainfall come from the fact that it has come in heavy showers which deliver the rain in a hit-and-miss fashion, leading to a very unsystematic distribution across the area.

Yes interesting analysis. If I were to give the summer so far marks out of ten I would give it 8/10 for beautiful summery conditions but for a gardener complaining about wanting rain this spring and summer 4/10. What a contrast to places north of the mythical M4. It's been a very dry period here and yesterday another warm summers day.

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Given that the warmest temperatures in the UK were actually further west on the south coast, and that's not for the first time in this past week either, i would say that it isn't really and extreme southeast split.

Since the start of July national day time top temps have been 3 times at Gosport on the south coast of Hampshire, 6 times at Heathrow in southwest London, and once at Charlwood Surrey, once in Farnborough Hampshire, 3 times at Pershore Wales, Exeter also picked up one. The extreme south east did pick up three temperature extreme's though but one was for the coldest night  Manston Kent picked up the hottest day for the extreme southeast on the 1st & 5th July, and if you want to include Essex in the 'extreme' southeast then Shoeburyness did have one day with the national top temp.

. The far SE tho including here have been very dry tho and all rain this month has been nuisance value. Coastal areas in the SE mainly missed the convection a few weeks back too. A properly wet day we have not had since March with a lot of usable weather albeit a bit disappointing  this month in particular. Overall tho a very benign summer to date. Felt more like Sept this morning tho at 6am 

Woke up expecting a nice sunny day as per forecast. Checked the satellite picture to see 85% of England and Wales sunny, expect the thick cloud across Southern NW England.

Sun popped out briefly late morning and it felt amazing now the wind has gone. Cloud had since thickened and we’ve managed just managed a shower.

Just 15 degrees which is poor for mid summer.

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The temperatures have been quite suppressed here this month, certainly something to moan about.
Average Max 17.2c, 2.8c below average here.

York average max has been 18.7c, the last 20 years July average max has been 21.5 again 2.8c below average.

Looks like July could be cooler than June here which is unusual.

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Yes interesting analysis. If I were to give the summer so far marks out of ten I would give it 8/10 for beautiful summery conditions but for a gardener complaining about wanting rain this spring and summer 4/10. What a contrast to places north of the mythical M4. It's been a very dry period here and yesterday another warm summers day.

 

Sticking to meteorlogical summer only, I'd give it a 5. Up until the crap weather setting in late June, it would have been running at around 7/10 - so you can work out what July gets. The April-May-June period would be up at around 8.5/10.

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Despite being mostly dry today, it's yet another day that has been ruined by this capped convection rubbish. North-westerly winds really are a ballache in summer! This will definitely be the worst July since 2007 around here now, possibly even since 1988 depending on what statistic you look at.

It has been in no way as wet as 2007, but the surpressed maxima have been starkly similar to 1988. I'd presume the dullness really compares with 1988 too?

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Well, would you believe it?

In a recent post on this thread, I ranted about the fact that at this stage in a summer month, we still can't even get a single day within this month which has 8 or more hours of sunshine.

For a while, it had looked as though today might just have been the day when we finally achieve such a feat as a total of 7.1 hours had been recorded for today at Edinburgh Gogarbank as at 6pm this evening.

However, there has been nothing at all in that department since then and the reason for that is because it then clouded over before we had a chance to see any additions to that total which I have just mentioned, and which now looks like bring today's final total as a result.

This means that our wait for that elusive first day of this month with 8 or more hours of sunshine goes on and yet given that the longest day was just over a month ago, such an amount of sunshine on any given day shouldn't be so hard for us to get at this time of the year.

July 2019 was also duller than average overall and even then, we still managed to get a total of 11.1 hours of sunshine on our sunniest day of that particular month and we have even had years with a day within that same month which has had twice this month's highest total so far with one such year being 2018 when the sunniest day of this same month within that year had a total of 16.1 hours of sunshine.

That on its own, shows just how pathetic, this month's sunshine totals for here have been even in comparison with the same month within even our poorest summers.

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Yes interesting analysis. If I were to give the summer so far marks out of ten I would give it 8/10 for beautiful summery conditions but for a gardener complaining about wanting rain this spring and summer 4/10. What a contrast to places north of the mythical M4. It's been a very dry period here and yesterday another warm summers day.

I would agree with this. Having said it's a far South Eastern split, I think the far South is more accurate. I think what is skewing my personal perception of Summer is that most of spring was glorious and I am conflating this with actual "meteorological" summer. That and working from home due to COVID-19 means that I've been able to get outside more and enjoy the weather.

Today was just slightly cooler at 22 degrees, but still mainly sunny with low humidty and remaining lovely and warm this evening.

 

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I would agree with this. Having said it's a far South Eastern split, I think the far South is more accurate. I think what is skewing my personal perception of Summer is that most of spring was glorious and I am conflating this with actual "meteorological" summer. That and working from home due to COVID-19 means that I've been able to get outside more and enjoy the weather.

Today was just slightly cooler at 22 degrees, but still mainly sunny with low humidty and remaining lovely and warm this evening.

 

I would probably agree with that and perhaps in my four listed areas above, I should probably have referred to the far south as being one of those two dry areas, rather than the far SE of England.

This then means that we're not far away from bringing Arty's neck of the woods down in Somerset into that southernmost drier area and it may well be that he is just within that area and no more.

 

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After consistently looking OK for several days, our Saturday cross-Channel ferry (Portsmouth-Caen) now looking distinctly choppy. 

I'll have to remember to remove my mask before chundering.

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Chichester, not unusually, has been extremely dry.. and our garden is parched and I'm daily having to water to keep the flowers going...although it's not been particularly warm for our south coast location, we've had some beautiful weather... gloriously sunny, with temps in the low 70's ... which for me, is a perfect temperature... we've had the odd,cooler, cloudier day but precious little rain.

 

Given that the warmest temperatures in the UK were actually further west on the south coast, and that's not for the first time in this past week either, i would say that it isn't really and extreme southeast split.

Since the start of July national day time top temps have been 3 times at Gosport on the south coast of Hampshire, 6 times at Heathrow in southwest London, and once at Charlwood Surrey, once in Farnborough Hampshire, 3 times at Pershore Wales, Exeter also picked up one. The extreme south east did pick up three temperature extreme's though but one was for the coldest night  Manston Kent picked up the hottest day for the extreme southeast on the 1st & 5th July, and if you want to include Essex in the 'extreme' southeast then Shoeburyness did have one day with the national top temp.

Again the UK hot spot was at Gosport on the south coast AT 24.7C 

The last week saw an improvement in terms of sunshine and temperatures but remained unsettled throughout. In no way could it have been described as a good spell but at least it felt a bit more like normal summer weather. Now it's back to the full blown 2007/2012 style horror

A summer's afternoon in late July, supposed to be the warmest time of the year, and the temperature at 3:30 was 11.8C -more like the temperature you would expect at 3:30am. Grey skies and damp all day but just 0.2mm. It's the absolute pits. Disgusting and depressing. Yet another day where it is as bad as it can possibly get.

I've only recorded five July days colder than today's dismal max of 12.6C and four of those were in 2012 with the other in 2008. All were earlier in the month. Could well be the coldest late July day since 1971 when there were maxes of 12C on both the 23rd and 24th. Of course it could get warmer this evening, as can happen in winter and it feels like a winter's day at the moment

What is really galling is that Shetland is enjoying day after day of sunshine and looks in with a chance of being sunnier than here, and indeed many parts of mainland Britain, for the second summer month in a row

Another vomit inducing horror scenario that makes you ask just what the hell is happening to our weather? Once again the garbage is hundreds of miles further south of where it should be. Come winter it will be the same old relentless westerlies and Euro High crap. Same predictable tedium ad nauseum these days in the worst era for a weather enthusiast in recorded history

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The last week saw an improvement in terms of sunshine and temperatures 

I thought you had been quiet. 

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The sunshine levels this July so far have been atrocious following on from a mediocre June for this area. 

Take this location as an example towards the extreme, Leconfield, just 53.6hrs this July up to yesterday.

 

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26° reached this afternoon and very humid with a gusty warm breeze. Got a sweat on walking around my local park. Tomorrow looks the same, perhaps ever so slightly less humid. Saturday, rain is forecast which my dust bowl of a garden badly requires. Let's see if we can get some actual precipitation falling....

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2020 - Highest Daily Max - 26.5c

2018 - Average Daily Max - 26.5c

Rainfall about the same, 25mm or so for the month, and about a 5c difference in temps. To be honest the last few days have been 24 or 25 every day, most days about 20c, and with any sunshine has felt reasonably nice out, just a huge diff in temps.

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Some sunshine in the morning, quickly vanished , more cloudy gloom, struggled to reach 18 - 19c , a few sharp showers later in the afternoon, which then turned to grey drizzly garbage. It did mange to clear in the evening with some more glimpses of sunshine, however feeling cool in the breeze. This weeks best temperature was yesterday 23c. Amazing how you go West just some miles and a stark difference in weather. It always astonishes me how a small country can have such contrasting weather.

The “Meh” Summer continues unabated, bland dreariness and mediocrity abound. All we need is “Tapioca Tundra” played on a loop on the radio and a half full glass of warm stale beer.