This morning I stepped out of the house and noticed a change. The slick of mud and leaf mulch on the road and pavements had dried out, the cloud base had lifted, and although it was neither cold nor particularly mild, there was a fresh and steely feel to the air.

Autumn is over. It has to be the worst season of the year, gradually deteriorating into dark dampness like a slow death, with only a few brief moments of relief like that warm final day of October. Good riddance to autumn.

 . . . And then this winter go onto being a carbon copy of last year and end up wishing we had stayed in Autumn after all.  

Autumn only gets a bad rap because it comes in after summer.  Its also is the season before the season most of us love - winter for the snow.  So we cant wait to get over it.

I actually quite enjoy Autumn before it gets too dark to early.  Some brilliant photography can be had - with lots of vibrant colours, chilly misty mornings, yet as we found this autumn especially - quite hot during the day at times.

DATA TABLE FOR RADSTOCK FOR AUTUMN 2014 FINAL FIGURES (SEP 1ST-NOV 30TH)

After a quiet September with below average rainfall October gave more in the way of rain but there was nothing exceptional. Temperatures remained above average for much of the time and there were a couple of very warm early September days. The Autumn fog season got under way but cleared quickly in the strong morning sunshine on the days it occurred. A notable thunderstorm occurred here on the 18th September under spanish plume conditions and gave rise to some damage from lightning strikes and surface flooding issues. October saw a step upwards in the strength of the wind after Septembers calm conditions with the remains of hurricane Gonzalo making appearance to our shores on the 21st. However, overall September and October proved very acceptable months overall and despite the lack of dry days in October rainfall amounts were suppressed by the warm SW flow and High pressure to the South. In November the benign season continued with no more than average rainfall and sunshine amounts and temperatures generally above average with some warm days at times. So all in all apart from a briefly stormy period in October the period of warmer than average seasons continue and with much less rainfall than last year at this time and only a slow drop in temperature as we approach Winter there was or is nothing alarming to report in conditions currently.

Autumn can be good if there are cool nights and lots of sunshine to give good colours as was the case in 2012 contrasting sharply with the summer.

There was none of that in Autumn 2014 an unremittingly vile season due to ridiculously persistent SE winds which have been the scourge of 2014. Hated every minute of it except for the last 10 days of November which I spent in Tenerife enjoying lots of sunshine, great sunsets, several impressive rainbows, snow on Teide the whole time which turned orange at sunset. Fantastic stuff

Here it was just disgusting grey depressing gloom for three months - the dullest autumn since 1968. The last three weeks have had just 2 dry days and 12.9 hours of sunshine If this were to persist throughout the winter it would make winter 2013/14 seem like a picnic by comparison. Utterly awful, soul destroying rubbish. Don't normally go on holiday in November so glad I changed that this year.

Excellent and informative post - Thanks Martin.