Trip Reports, News & Mountain Conditions for the Sierra Nevada » Weather

Climbing the Cerro de Caballo and want to know what the weather will be like?

admin — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 10:48:09 +0000

If you intend to climb the Cerro de Caballo which lies just above the Alpujarras spa town of Lanjaron in the Sierra Nevada, you may be interested in the following weather forecasting model.

Wind speed, Wind gusts, Wind direction, Wind chill (°C), Temperature (°C), Cloud cover (%), Pressure (hPa) and expected Precipitation (mm/3h) are all interesting and useful indicators if you are heading for the high Sierras.

More info, maps, details

Spindrift blows across the Cerro de Caballo

Alpujarras weather trends in 2011 from our Lanjaron meteo station

admin — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 19:54:06 +0000

At the end of the year it is always interesting to look at the extremes, averages and trends in the years weather. Our weather station in Lanjaron, Alpujarras has provided the following information for 2011 (2010 figures in brackets).

Temperatures – nothing too different on the maximums and minimums, but interesting to note that 2011 was far more extreme overall than in 2010. The number of times the temperatures exceeded 30 or were less than 10 were much more than in 2010.

Rainfall much higher in 2010, but that was an exceptional year.

View all the Alpujarras climate data since 2006

Temperatures

Max High 36.3 (2010 38.2)
Min Low 0.3 (2010 0.0)
Average temp 15.8 (2010 16.0)
Average max 27.6 (2010 26.7)
Average min 7.1 (2010 7.1)
Max temperature over 30 degrees on – 48 days (2010 – 26 days)
Min temperature under 10 degrees on – 154 days (2010 – 114 days)

Rainfall

Total precipitation 442mm (2010 720mm)
Days when precipitation over 2.5mm – 37 days (2010 – 42 days)

Wind

Maximum gust 61 km/hr (2010 61 km/hr)
Average maximum gust throughout the year 22.6 km/hr (2010 – 26.3 km/hr)
Average speed 2.4 km/hr (2010 3.2 km/hr)
Average wind direction – 265

Click to load Climate Data 2011 in larger window

Alpujarras Weather Records September 2011

admin — Sun, 02 Oct 2011 10:22:14 +0000

A summary of the weather high and lows, ups and downs, for September 2011 from the Alpujarras Weather Station based in Lanjaron is shown below.

Highlights – the highest temperature was 32.6 (lowest 11.7 ). A total of 1.8mm of rain fell over 2 days. The highest wind gust was 42.5kmh.

Previous year - the highest temperature was 28.7 (lowest 11.8 ). A total of 30.4mm of rain fell. The highest wind gust was 53.6kmh.

Full summaries are shown below or visit the full statistical weather data.

Links to the station which is live on the internet during daylight hours can be found below.
Visit the Lanjaron weather station live datafeed - live interactive weather station data.
View past weather records and climate data since 2005 – useful for comparison purposes
Sierra Nevada Mountain Weather Forecasts - essential reading for mountain goers!

Click image below for a larger version

Alpujarras-weather-records-sept2011

Alpujarras Weather Station Records for August 2011

admin — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 08:20:12 +0000

A summary of the highs and lows for August 2011 from our weather station set in Lanjaron, Alpujarras, Andalucia. Links to the station which is live on the internet during daylight hours can be found below.

Records for the month of August 2011

Alpujarra Weather Station August 2011

You may also be interested in:
Visit the Lanjaron weather station live datafeed
View past weather records
Sierra Nevada Mountain Weather Forecasts

Alpujarras Weather Station records for July 2011

admin — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 05:46:05 +0000

A summary of the highs and lows for July 2011 from our weather station set in Lanjaron, Alpujarras, Andalucia. Links to the station which is live on the internet during daylight hours can be found below.

Records for the month of July 2011

alpujarras-weather-records-july-2011

You may also be interested in:
Visit the Lanjaron weather station live datafeed
View past weather records
Sierra Nevada Mountain Weather Forecasts

Alpujarras monthly weather records since 2005

admin — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 09:07:02 +0000

If you are a statistic freak like me, live in southern Spain and are constantly talking to friends about the ins and outs of the weather then this post may be for you. Put the myths to bed! When somebody says “It’s not as hot as it was last year!” or “It didn’t rain as much last year!”, then you now have the answer at your fingertips.

Below are the facts as recorded by our monthly records from our weather station at Lanjaron in the Alpujarras, Andalucia. The lowest temperature each month, the highest temperature each month, the average low and high and the number of days and amount of rain.

Visit the Live Weather Station
The Monthly Weather Records website

Alpujarras Weather Station records for June 2011

admin — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 07:15:11 +0000

A summary of the highs and lows for June 2011 from our weather station set in Lanjaron, Alpujarras, Andalucia. Links to the station which is live on the internet during daylight hours can be found below.

Records for the month of June 2011

alpujarra-weather-station-june-2011

You may also be interested in:
Visit the Lanjaron weather station live datafeed
View past weather records
Sierra Nevada Mountain Weather Forecasts

Alpujarra Weather Station Records for March 2011

admin — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 12:22:56 +0000

A summary of the highs and lows for March 2011 from our weather station set in Lanjaron, Alpujarras, Andalucia. Links to the station which is live on the internet during daylight hours can be found below.

Records for the month of March 2011

alpujarras-weather-records-march-2011

You may also be interested in:
Visit the Lanjaron weather station live datafeed
View past weather records
Sierra Nevada Mountain Weather Forecasts

The effects of windchill when in the mountains

admin — Sat, 12 Mar 2011 11:28:59 +0000

Windchill is a factor we take into account most times when we visit the high Sierras. We ignore it at our peril. A 32km hour wind at 0 degrees centigrade gives an effective -12.5 degree “feel” to the temperature. The chart below will help in ascertaining the dangers.

Most likely from December to February each year, we can get -10 degree temperatures at 3000m on Mulhacen with winds of 56km per hour. This gives a dangerous effective temperature of -32.5 degrees! Within minutes exposed areas of the body can become iced.

I remember our recent trip to the Patagonian Icefield in November 2010. It wasn’t very cold in reality, maybe zero degrees BUT we had a 100+km/hr wind to cope with. It ended up being one of the coldest and most exposed experiences of my life. Effective temperatures were all day consistently at -25 or below. No part of the body could be exposed to the raging spindrift.

A windchill chart is shown below that shows the cooling effects of wind given relative air temperatures. It is self explanatory. Yellow shading signifies danger of icing in 1 minute. Pink shading in under 30 seconds! Hope you find it useful.

windchill-chart

Alpujarras Weather for your iPhone or Android Smartphones

admin — Wed, 16 Feb 2011 10:45:23 +0000

Get Live Weather, Records, Graphs, Webcam and Forecasts for the Alpujarras region of southern Spain direct to your iPhone, Android or Smartphone.

Our Davis Vantage Pro weather station here in Lanjaron, in the Alpujarras, has been operating now for some 3 years and provided us with much information and records about the weather patterns here. Now we have prepared a smartphone version integrating readings from the station, utilising software developed by Sietse Vissar.

Alpujarras smartphone weather

Available is the following data…………. (temperatures, humidity, rainfall, wind)

Current weather summary - ie whats happening now!
Live Weather – Detailed breakdowns of current weather
Historical weather data – for the past hour, day, week, month etc
Graphs – Detailed graphs for the past hour, day, week, month etc
Webcam – Our up to date webcam view of Lanjaron refreshed every minute
Forecast – 10 day forecast from the reliable yo.no
Weather Station locator on Google Maps

Settings – there are many settings for displaying the readings (eg degrees C or F). In addition you can change language to spanish as well as many other languages.

Just point your smartphone browser to http://www.spanishhighs.co.uk/smartphone/ and bookmark it to your homepage.

……… and voila!

We have tested this on most smartphones successfully, but have had some trouble getting it to function correctly on Symbian based Nokia phones. Any feed back would be welcomed.