Weather and climate on the island Mallorca

Mallorca ist the bathing island for the beach vacationers par exellence. Millions of people pilger every year to the beaches of Mallorca to enjoy the sun, the sea and the beach. The stream of beach vacationers is mainly concentrated in the warm summer months; Mallorca and/or the Balearic Islands are not a bathing paradise for the whole year as for example the Canarian Islands. This is not surprising as with a distance of two flight hours, Mallorca is practically around the corner. Concerning the climate, Mallorca has a typical mediterranean climate with hot and dry summers and mild winters.

But the climate in Mallorca is far from being stable. Dry and hot summers and pleasantly mild winters are indeed the type of the climate, but there are often strong deviations. This is due to the reason that Mallorca is practically at the border of different temperate zones. For example, while the greek islands Kreta or Kos are strongly dominated by the mediterranean climate, the climate of Mallorca is periodically strongly influenced by North Africa and the atlantic low pressure regions.

The graphic of the climate of the rainy days show that during the summer months from June to August, the average days of rain are 1 or 2 per month. So, in the summertime, one can count with a lot of sun and warm temperatures. A little shower of rain for a couple of hours might not spoil a holiday. But if a low pressure region that comes from the atlantic browses over Europe and its foothills touch Mallorca, it can rain continously for a couple of days even in the summer time, also wind and storm. Also, the temperatures fall to uncomfortable values under 20°C. But as expected, most of the rainfalls occur during the winter months, normaly in form of rain; but once in a blue moon it occurs that it snows in the island. But in Mallorca, the beaches covered with snow are for winter vacationers also a short highlight, in which many a pictures are made.

A view to the graphic of the day and night temperatures show that during the months May to October pleasant temperatures over 20°C are to be considered. But the graphic also shows clearly that the differences in the temperatures between the day and the night are of more than approximately 10°C throughout the year. This means that one should better got out in the evenings or in the night with long pants and maybe also take a pullover with him. If I talked in the beginning of mild winters, then it is recognizable from the climate graphic that even during the winter months from December to February one can hope to have a temperature up to 15°C at daytime. But as these are average values, the degrees can also increase in some warm winter day to more than 20°C and it is possible to have a sunbath outside. But what should be much more important than the daily temperatures for most of the german winter vacationers is the fact that at night, the temperatures do not fall far under 10°C and only seldom, the freezing point is reached.

From the day and night temperatures it can be logically concluded that Mallorca is not a holiday region for the whole year. The big bathing season is definetely during the summer months June to September, when also most of the families enjoy the school holidays. In the after-season in October there are still pleasant air temperatures and the water has also still pleasant values over 20°C; in October, there are more families with no children of school age but young children and couples without children, young and old ones; Even if the beach vacationers make the biggest part of the tourists of Mallorca, there are also hikers, cyclists and other sportive people that get prepared to the season in Mallorca; those rather prefer the spring time and the autumn with the mild day temperatures with which one does not sweat too much; Winter holidays are possible in Mallorca, but only limited. The reason for this is that many hotels are completely closed during the winter months.

If in the summer months the day temperature apporaches 30°C, it is very pleasant to have an hotel room with air conditioning, especially because the rooms get even more heated by the solar radiation and even with open windows, the warm air in the evenings is hardly possible to get out of the room.

Those who want to spend the winter months, the late autumn or the beginning of spring in Mallorca have to count with the fact that in the hotel rooms there will be always cold air. Then one is very pleased that at home, one simply turns on the heating. But in the hotels of Mallorca, heatings are not self evident at all. Thus, before the booking, one should get the information whether a heating is available and/or if the air conditioner does not only provide cold but also warm air.

Weatherwise, in the island Mallorca there are not only seasonal variations but also regional ones. Many clowds from the atlantic low pressure foothills that browse over the European mainland loose their humidity in the nordic areas of the island; As consequence, in some years, in the north of Mallorca there were 1500 mm of rainfalls , while in the south not even 500 mm of water fell from the sky. Such foothills of browsing low pressure areas also provoke strong winds at the north coast with partly metres high waves. In resume one can say that the weather in the north coast is, in the average of a year, rougher and more wet than in the south of the island.

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Copyright: Patrick Wagner, www.tourist-guide.biz