November is not my favourite month. It is still Autumn but the season of mellow fruitfulness has long gone, the leaves changed colour, gave a show for a while but now lie rotting by the roadside.
February is mercifully short - and spring might be just round the corner, though sometimes it dawdles.
In November 2009 we took a trip from Luxor through the oases of the New Valley, then west to Siwa near the Libyan border before turning east along the Mediterranean coast and through the delta to Cairo.
China
In November 2010 Kunming, The City of Eternal Spring, failed to live up to its name but our journey through South West China warmed up as we travelled further south. We finished in Guilin with a warm if rather misty trip on the Li River.
Even further south in Hong Kong the sun shone brightly and across the estuary in the former Portuguese colony of Macau the temperature was close to the boundary where warm becomes hot.
Myanmar
November in Myanmar is the start of winter and communities club together to provide new warm cloaks for the monks. That is what they said, but it was no sort of winter we could recognise. Yangon was hot and tropical.
while in the higher lands around Lake Inle it was much cooler - like an English summer's day.
Thailand
In Bangkok the heat never lets up, though the few days we spent there in November 2012 were not exactly free from rain.
Portugal
Even in Europe there are places where November is pleasant. October is a far better month in the Algarve, but I have swum in the Atlantic in November (once) and even on the cooler and windy west coast November is still tee-shirt time.
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| Leaves lie rotting by the roadside. Betley, Nov 2008 |
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| Thomas Hood National Portrait Gallery, unknown artist, image from Wikipedia |
December starts badly, too, but then comes the winter solstice and the start of a slow, painfully slow, improvement. And the Christmas and New year holidays provide a little light relief at the darkest time of the year.
January is at least the start of something new.
February is mercifully short - and spring might be just round the corner, though sometimes it dawdles.
I do like cold, clear, crisp winter days with blue sky above and crunchy white frost below, but you don't get those in November. Without a doubt, November is my twelfth favourite month.
And others feel the same way. Thomas Hood put it nicely almost two hundred years ago.
"November"
No sun--no moon!
No morn--no noon!
No dawn--no dusk--no proper time of day--
No sky--no earthly view--
No distance looking blue--
No road--no street--
No "t'other side the way"--
No end to any Row--
No indications where the Crescents go--
No top to any steeple--
No recognitions of familiar people--
No courtesies for showing 'em--
No knowing 'em!
No mail--no post--
No news from any foreign coast--
No park--no ring--no afternoon gentility--
No company--no nobility--
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease,
No comfortable feel in any member--
No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees,
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds,
November!
No morn--no noon!
No dawn--no dusk--no proper time of day--
No sky--no earthly view--
No distance looking blue--
No road--no street--
No "t'other side the way"--
No end to any Row--
No indications where the Crescents go--
No top to any steeple--
No recognitions of familiar people--
No courtesies for showing 'em--
No knowing 'em!
No mail--no post--
No news from any foreign coast--
No park--no ring--no afternoon gentility--
No company--no nobility--
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease,
No comfortable feel in any member--
No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees,
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds,
November!
This year we have spent November at home. I am not complaining, we have ventured abroad four times in 2014, not to mention sundry trips around Britain so I have nothing to complain about - indeed we are very fortunate to be able to travel as often and as far as we do - but that does not change the basic fact: some places get a better deal out of November than Staffordshire.
Here are some photos of several such places, none have appeared in the blog before, either for reasons of space or because they predate it.
Egypt
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| Lynne in the 'White Desert' Farafra Oasis, Egypt The valley floor is covered with chalk - there is no water down there |
Northern Egypt had warm days, but the evenings could be a bit nippy. Further south it was balmy. |
| Siwa Oasis, Egypt |
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| On a barchan dune, Kharga Oasis, Egypt Blown by the wind, these crescent shaped dunes march slowly across the valley floor engulfing anything that stands in their way |
China
In November 2010 Kunming, The City of Eternal Spring, failed to live up to its name but our journey through South West China warmed up as we travelled further south. We finished in Guilin with a warm if rather misty trip on the Li River.
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| On the Li River, Guilin |
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| Portuguese remnants, Macau |
November in Myanmar is the start of winter and communities club together to provide new warm cloaks for the monks. That is what they said, but it was no sort of winter we could recognise. Yangon was hot and tropical.
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| Yangon, hot and steamy (November 2012) |
while in the higher lands around Lake Inle it was much cooler - like an English summer's day.
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| Yawana Village, Lake Inle, Myanmar |
In Bangkok the heat never lets up, though the few days we spent there in November 2012 were not exactly free from rain.
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| Lynne goes to visit the Emerald Buddha, Bangkok |
Portugal
Even in Europe there are places where November is pleasant. October is a far better month in the Algarve, but I have swum in the Atlantic in November (once) and even on the cooler and windy west coast November is still tee-shirt time.
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| Praia de Odeceixe, November 2008 |