Topsy Turvy

Easter is just about as late as it can be this year, which must have been a great encouragement to all those people in Britain who fancied the idea of a week or two in the sun over the holiday period, and booked flights down to the Costa del Sol. But things have been turned on their head so far as climate is concerned. They could have found all the warm sun and blue skies that they desire right back there on their own doorsteps in the UK. Here, by contrast, the temperatures plummeted last weekend, the clouds came rolling in borne by stiff breezes, and the rain started falling. Today, Good Friday, we are promised several hours of rain and a daytime high of 14 or 15 degrees. Which is now worse than the rest of the week so far, nor any worse than what is promised for tomorrow and Sunday.

Matters are just as depressing for the local population. As I described last time, this is a week of elaborate religious processions wending their way around the streets of cities, towns and villages; not this year. Yesterday for instance, of the seven cofradias who should have been processing through Málaga, only one was able to leave its home base. On the one hand the costumes, robes and vestments of penitents and statues would be badly damaged by the rain; on the other, the underfoot conditions would make it too dangerous to attempt to carry the tronos through the streets. I’m not sure how many processions have had to be cancelled in total this week, nor how many will fall victim to the weather today and on Sunday, but the toll is likely to be very high indeed. In fact, I just looked out of the window and the rain has set in again.

I could say that this is not typical weather for late April, but I seem to have been calling different periods of weather ‘not typical’ quite frequently. Is climate change serving up new typical patterns, or a future defined by unpredictable weather patterns? I don’t know; I suppose we will have to wait and see.