UK Spring Bank Holiday - yuck

In early April I was in Wales; I posted a blog to say how un-seasonal the weather was. More like July - children eating ice cream, women in short sleeved tops. It turned out to be the warmest April on record. People were talking about a long hot summer with the inevitable restrictions on water use.

Then came May - it has behaved like an unruly mixed-up teenager, throwing in-turn sulks and tantrums. The beginning of last week it was wet and cold, but by mid-week it started to warm-up. But by Saturday afternoon it was back too heavy rain and cold.

Yesterday was Whit Sunday more heavy rain, and today is Spring Bank Holiday, which normally is the time when the UK starts to stir and prepare for hopefully an inrush of summer tourists. When I say hopefully, I’m reporting the tourist industries view. Me - well anybody who has read my previous blogs know I really detest tourists; they make my life a misery, blocking up: the pavements, access areas to Underground stations and shops. Sorry about that little rant - no I’m not sorry, if I can’t rant on my own blog, then where can I rant?

As I was saying London and the other tourist attractions around the UK start opening up. Deckchairs are put out in parks - though this year with the hot April they were put out a month early. In seaside towns small hotels wake up from their winter hibernation.

For future reference of overseas tourists to the UK, please take note - it doesn’t matter how much you read about it being warm and dry in the UK, remember, whether it’s the Spring or Summer Bank Holiday, in the UK,

Bank Holiday = guaranteed rain.

For years, why it rained on Bank Holidays, remained a mystery. Then YesBut’s top investigation reporter discovered the truth. The owners of London’s tourists’ attractions don’t want tourists to go window shopping in Oxford and Regent Streets or sunbath in the parks. They want the tourists to dig deep into their pockets and pay to go into their attractions. So for a week leading up to Bank Holidays they employ a group of shamans to do rain dances and cast rain spells.

Last Thursday and Friday Trafalgar Square was covered with turf, to convert it into a “Village Green”. The idea was to demonstrate how London is made up of a number of villages which have grown together to form an urban conurbation. But each retains its own individual characteristics; Chelsea is unmistakably Chelsea, while Hampstead with its heath has its own unique character. Well if they had left the turf there for yesterday and today the rain and trampling tourists would have converted Trafalgar Square into a Chinese paddy field.

This morning as well as the rain the tourists will have to cope with gale force gusts of wind.

YesBut global warming - easy solution declare everyday a Bank Holiday.

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