The Weather Outlook

When looking at our voyage calendar there seemed to be the possibility of some cold weather and very hot weather. The weather certainly has a bearing on what to pack for the trip, so one of the first things I did was check weather data for the ports on our voyage. There is a nice site for Historic Weather Data compiled by the World Meteorological Organization. I was able to get the average daily minimum temp, the average daily maximum temp, and the average days of rainfall for most of the ports.  We were concerned mostly about being prepared for cold in St. Petersburg.  On our Spring 2010 voyage, we encountered sub-freezing temps in China and parts of Japan and very high temps in Saigon and Ghana.

Well, it looks like this will be pretty ideal.  One of the highlights of being on a ship is spending meal times on the deck.

So here are the historic data for our ports:

SAS Weather Fall 2014 from http://worldweather.wmo.int/

Location                               Month       Avg Daily min.    Avg Daily Max   Avg days rain

London                                 Aug                 56.8                        73.6                        8.1

St. Petersburg                       Aug                 55.0                        68.0                        11

Gdansk                                 Sept                 49.5                        62.4                        14

Rostock                                 Sept                 52.0                        63.3                        9.6

Antwerp (Brussels)               Sept                 51.4                        65.7                        9.9

Le Havre (Paris)                   Sept                  54.5                        69.4                        8.5

Dublin                                   Sept                  49.6                        62.6                       10.2

Lisbon                                   Oct                    58.3                        72.3                       11

Cadiz                                     Oct                    62.6                        73.8                       6

Casablanca                           Oct                     59.2                        71.8                       5

Dakar                                    Oct                     76.8                        87.6                       4

Takoradi/Tema                     Oct                     75.0                        86.9                       7

Rio De Janeiro                     Nov                    70.5                        81.3                       11

Salvador                               Nov                     73.2                        84.0                      14

Bridgetown                          Nov                      No data available

Havana                                 Dec                      67.1`                      79.7                       5

Poland has the possibility of being a little damp and cold, and we anticipated rainfall in Ireland. But how nice will it be to have temps in the 60's and 70's in Cuba while everyone at home is freezing?  I've shared this on Facebook with the faculty and staff and students. Sorry, I won't rub it in, but I won't be packing a heavy jacket, either.