Most conversations with people from Western Europe start with a question about the weather. One can imagine something about a Greek holiday summer, but what is it like in Greece in winter?
First: Greece, the mainland anyway, is a mountainous country. That means lots of local differences in weather, lots of variation and microclimates. In addition, Greece is also bigger than the Low Countries. From our region in the south to northern Greece is 500 km as the crow flies, and the climate obviously varies. We have a mild winter climate in the South by the sea, but in the North it is colder in winter, and certainly in the mountains there is also quite a bit of snow in winter. There are ski resorts in Greece, though they are not open all winter.
Anyway, back to the Mani, the region where we live. A Mediterranean climate means dry, hot summers and mild winters with rain. If we compare with Kruibeke, our home base in Belgium, there is almost as much rain here every year, but 85% of it falls from October to March. In June, July and August combined, it rains an average of 3.6 days. The thing that feels perhaps as the biggest difference is the light in winter. During the winter rainy months in Greece, it is not continuously grey, cloudy and dark. This year, from 1 to 17 December in Belgium, there was a total of 6 hours of sunshine. Once the showers in Greece are over, it clears up and it becomes sunny and warm. Even in the 6 winter months, you have 60% blue sky here, which is almost double that of Belgium.
Occasionally it can also get really ugly in winter. There are some winter storms every year with big gusts and hailstorms, where the otherwise calm sea pounds the coast with big waves.
The sun is still powerful in winter. In the afternoon in the sun and out of the wind, you can eat outside in a light jumper or T-shirt. Which brings us to southern temperatures. On average, the temperature in our Greek region is 7 degrees warmer than in Belgium during the day, 4 degrees warmer at night. In winter, 15-20 degrees during the day. As soon as the sun sets, it does get cold, it is 10 degrees less at night than during the day. At our seaside, it doesn’t freeze. The mountains behind us do have snow on the highest peaks from Dec/Jan to April.
Winters here are green. From November, the arid, brown-red soil recovers. From January onwards lowers start blooming and by March everything is covered in a carpet of flowers. Most trees do not lose their leaves or change leaves briefly.
From June to September, daytime temperatures are close to 30 degrees, with some spikes to 40 degrees during a heat wave. Then too it cools down 10 degrees at night. Actually, summer is our least favourite season. It is too hot to walk. The landscape becomes barren and dry, and everyone is on alert for possible forest fires. Swimming in the sea is the only suitable activity in the hot afternoons.
But the in-between seasons, April/May and September/October are really perfect in terms of temperatures, 20 -25 degrees during the day.
We too live in a region with a microclimate. The high mountains shield us from the ‘meltemi’ wind, the northeast wind that often blows south through the Aegean Sea and is strongly felt on all islands. This means that, despite living by the sea, we have few windy days, and the sea is also often flat with few waves. Because of the mountains, you can also sometimes have a 5-degree temperature difference a few km away, or go from gale force winds to windless.
One last difference is day length. Being more southerly, days are up to 1h50′ longer in winter than in Belgium, and just as much shorter in summer.
Another fact for those who like to compare data: at https://weatherspark.com , you will find an option ‘Compare cities’ at the bottom. Enter ‘Kardamyli’ and your location there, and you get the climate comparison in nice graphs.
We wish you all another Merry Christmas and a Happy 2025!
Bart & Els
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