April is doing exactly as April should here in Phuket. After the weather "broke" at the end of March, we've had a few more showers, but mostly very hot weather with people even dying from heatstroke last week. That is extreme, but it does need to be stressed - most of the time Phuket is HOT. You need to make sure that you stay hydrated, don't get *too* much sun. It's OK for me, I am used to it, but if you visit from chilly Europe, you can easily get dehydrated. And I hate to say it, but beer is not the cure! This is the HOT season right now. There is very little wind, the days are hot and the nights are not really cool either! The heat can build up until a thunderstorm clears the air, every day or 3 there will be localised thunder, nothing to really spoil a holiday and (believe it or not) actually quite welcome after all the heat.

The last update on the Phuket weather blog was April 7th, 2 weeks ago. So I will now add some photos and Tweets from the last 2 weeks. It's April 21st today and I start a little holiday tomorrow. a couple of weeks not in Phuket! We'll be up and down the east coast of Thailand from Nakorn Si Thammarat to Chumphon to Hua Hin, maybe to Kanchanaburi, west of Bangkok, maybe hop over to the west coast to Ranong or maybe go to Koh Samui on the east coast. No fixed plan, but I am happy to have a break after a busy high season.

For regular updates, photos, chat .. please do follow me on Twitter and Instagram! Thanks!

Moving on from the past... Here's a morning photo from April 9th. This is taken at the Bang Wad reservoir in Kathu, located in the hills behind Phuket Country Club golf course. Over the last month I have been here for a morning walk (6.5km around the reservoir) as many mornings as possible. It had rained a bit on the 8th, but only the usual brief downpour. Cleared the air nicely.



April 10th .. hot and a bit hazy.

If you want a good place to check the weather, try the Webcam at Patong Beach. And the company who operate the cam have a Youtube account, with timelapse videos of the webcam footage being uploaded most days. Here's April 10th ::



April 11th I did not Tweet about the weather or take a photo, I think this was due to being very busy at the dive shop. Because on the 12th and 13th we closed for the Songkran Festival. Here in Phuket, we really only "do" Songkran on the 13th, except I know in Patong the water fights start on the 12th. Anyway, it was nice to have a whole weekend to relax! Weather was hot on Saturday, I did some work around our house and found an unwelcome visitor hiding near the washing machine...



(above) Scorpion in my garden, April 12th :) No, I did not kill it, just threw it into next door's garden.

April 13th - SONGKRAN! I had prepared on the 12th and purchased a box of 24 bottles of Chang. No crazy party this year, only a bunch of drinks and a BBQ at the Easy Day Thailand office in Kathu, while throwing water at people passing by.



April 14th, and back to work ... Sunny at Karon beach, though a friend in the Phuket Town area Tweeted that it was raining hard. Again, just a brief shower, and sometimes it can rain in one part of Phuket and not another. Little thunderstorms can cover just a small area. It was very hot after Songkran. Photo below taken at a small roadside restaurant called Nong Built, opposite Karon post office. Good cheap local food here! It felt hotter than 32 degrees!



16th April .. more heat. I Tweeted "Phuket weather this morning : Bl**dy hot and feels very humid too. I will hide in the aircon office at Sunrise Divers all day."

17th April "Woken up to a grey, drizzly morning", but the rain stopped, so I was off for my morning exercise at the reservoir.



(above) 17th April at the reservoir. Early morning rain all gone, but the reservoir is looking quite empty. Not critical yet, but we need lots of rain in the next few months. Sorry if you are coming soon, but I want some rain :)

After work on the 17th I stopped at a bar in the hills over Patong for a sunset beer. I had meant to stop here for a long time, finally did, and will stop again - it's blogged on Jamie's Phuket : Wassa Homemade Bar.



(above) Sunset, April 17th :)

18th April started wet. I Tweeted "It's a bit of a wet morning ... Grey skies , rumbles of thunder and rain" and the local news posted photos of flooded roads on Facebook. Don't panic unless I tell you to panic, OK? Flooded road photos sell newspapers. In Phuket you sometimes get very brief floods lasting about an hour when there is heavy rain. In low season, occasionally several hours. On April 18th morning I drove 20km to work from Kathu (near Phuket Town) via Patong to Karon beach. No flooded roads. The art of news is to find one flooded road and sell it as PHUKET FLOODS! Yes, I am a cynic. In the afternoon, some customers came into the dive shop and said the day had been great. The morning rain had them worried, but it cleared up and the day was pretty sunny. This is normal.

19th April. Lovely day. Starting with a walk at the reservoir again. A Chinese shrine at the reservoir was officially opened last month, with steps leading up from one end of the dam. As part of my morning walk, I walked up the steps. Steep! Ouch! But nice view back along the dam ...



And in the evening, well .. wow .. very nice sunset at The Beach Bar. One of our favourite places, on the beach at Cape Panwa.



(above) Sunset in Phuket, 19th April

And the last 2 days have been hot and mostly sunny too. I am still in Phuket tomorrow, but will be away for a couple of weeks after that. I will also be watching the webcams on this blog (at Patong Beach / Karon Beach) to check on Phuket weather while we take a family holiday up and down the east coast of Thailand. See you soon!

Welcome to April! The Songkran Festival is just round the corner (13th April) and the weather is HOT, just as you'd expect. The last update on the Phuket weather blog was March 16th and we'd just had our first rain for over 2 months. It really has been a dry high season in 2014. On March 15th there was some afternoon rain for maybe 1 hour. Exciting news! Next day was a bit grey, but nice (for a local) to have a cooler day!

Please do follow me on Twitter for regular weather updates, Phuket news, photos ... Jamie on Twitter. And I also post photos on Instagram :)

On March 19th I Tweeted "Phuket weather - back to sun and blue skies the last 2 days after the clouds broke on Saturday and a grey Sunday."

That week was again mostly very hot, but unlike the months before the "first rain" at least we had some clouds in the sky.

On March 22nd, a Tweet "Such a hot day today ... The real "hot season" is here." - What is the HOT season? Well, it's NOW! It's when the northeast winds stop blowing, so you lose that cooling effect. The days are hot, and all that heat sometimes leads to thunderstorms. Often in the middle of the day or in the night. On the 22nd, 1 week since the last rain, we had a little rain in the night. I checked the rain gauge next day, it was only 8mm, compared to 15mm the week before.



(above) Sunset in the rear view mirror, before the rain on 22nd March

I do apologise if updates are sometimes a bit lacking - I am working 6 days per week in high season at Sunrise Divers. Sometimes forget to Tweet or take any kind of photo. Anyway, the weather in the week after 22nd March was again hot, sunny, nothing to report!



(above) Timelapse video showing weather at Patong Bay on March 26th, from the Webcam.



(above) View over Karon Beach, March 28th. You get this view on the road to Karon from Patong. Always been a favourite view.

And then, would you believe it ... March 29th we had another little shower of rain in the night (14mm at my house), one week after the last rain and 2 weeks after the "first rain" ... 3 Saturdays in a row. Only Saturdays. Next morning, 30th March, all blue skies again ...



(above) Blue skies at the traffic lights between Phuket Town and Patong, 30th March 2014

On March 31st I Tweeted about the heat, and later in the evening "I can see flashes of lightning to the North. Must be raining somewhere! Where I am (Kathu) it's dry, hot and the air is still." (Kathu is my area, it's in between Phuket Town and the hills, to the east of Patong beach). Now Like I say, heat + no wind = thunder. We did not get it on the 30th, but on the 31st we got some heavy rain, and there was even some localised flooding in some places round the island. Not that much at my house, but the power went off for an hour. The morning of the 31st was sunny, clouds started to gather, but there was no rain until the night. Was thundery and wet for an hour. I measured 25mm of rain. Exact rain does vary around the island. And while I had a 1 hour power outage, one friend told me at his house it was off for 5 hours.

But on April 1st I was up early for my exercise at Bang Wad Reservoir. It's just over 6.5km to walk a circuit of the reservoir. On April 1st the clouds were hanging over the hills and the morning was nice and fresh.



(above) View of our clouded hills, walking around Bang Wad reservoir, 1st April

The April 1st Tweet "And this morning here at Karon beach, it's very grey with a few drips of rain falling. This really is the first grey, wet day for 3 months!" - no joke! We did actually have a grey day and then I suddenly got many messages via email, Twitter, Facebook .. people fretting about the weather. OMG! Rain! We're coming next week! Forecast says rain!

Chill out. One wet day after 3 months of dry weather? What's to worry about?!

April is normally HOT, very HOT. There will be occasional rain or thunderstorms, this is tropical weather. Phuket is a tropical island. Look at all the green jungly hills... how do they get so green? RAIN! But there's more sun that rain, there's really no reason to worry about the weather in Phuket.

Yes we had a bit of rain this week. It was nice! A Tweet from later on April 1st "After last night's rain and a grey morning, the afternoon in Phuket was brighter and even sunny later on." - See? Nothing to worry about!

April 2nd was hot and sunny. April 3rd started grey with rumbles of thunder. Here's another view at the reservoir (yes, I am trying to do plenty of exercise this year!) ...



(above) April 3rd started cloudy and thundery ... And later on a Tweet "P*ssing down with rain now at Karon Beach. Don't suppose it will last long though.". And it did not last long. A couple of hours later, another Tweet "A Tweet for those who worry about the weather - the afternoon in Phuket is now hot and sunny." :)

A Tweet from April 4th "How was the weather in Phuket today? Started cloudy and grey and has got brighter. Now a sunny late afternoon."

April 5th, I was up early on a Saturday .. normally my day off, but we had a big group of divers today and I wanted to make sure everything went off without a problem. But it was a wet start to the day ...



(above) Wet morning at home, April 5th. And when I got to Karon Beach, it was also very grey, but cleared up later.

April 6th - yesterday, Sunday. HOT AND SUNNY. And I got sunburn working round the house for a couple of hours. A real scorcher of a day. And today, April 7th, has been the same. A cool, drizzly day now and then is very nice. But in April, most days will be hot and sunny.



(above) My view at lunchtime today at the Sala Bua restaurant next door to Sunrise Divers.

Weather forecast ... HOT AND SUNNY with some rain and thunder now and then. It's April. Enjoy the heat. Enjoy Songkran!

Cheers from Phuket.