South for Sunshine

There's an alarming tendency amongst people to assume that because it is overcast and raining where they are, then it must be like that everywhere else.  Consequently, they slouch around in a bad mood, mumbling at me that I picked the wrong time to take off of work didn't I?  Implying that I've completely wasted several weeks of leave, (the thought of which seems to cheer them up minutely).  My only response to such comments is to head South.  It's like the old Southern Railway advertising slogan used to say: 'South for Sunshine'.  It's true, as I've found several times over the past couple of weeks, by driving South of Crapchester, I inevitably run into sunshine and clear skies.  Well OK, I will admit that on Tuesday I spent part of the day trying to dodge torrential rain in the New Forest, but it did eventually ease off sufficiently for me to enjoy an interesting walk.  Today was a better example: as I left Crapchester the rain started coming down and the sky was iron grey with cloud, but the closer to the coast I got, the clearer the sky and the sunnier the weather, as these pictures attest:

 

Sure, it was a bit breezy - I think the correct term is 'bracing' - but nonetheless an enjoyable experience.  Indeed, for a while I thought that I might have fallen through a rift in the space-time continuum as, whilst checking my map book in a car park, a wartime DC3 Dakota transport plane, in full RAF WW2 colours, including 'invasion stripes', flew low overhead.  Less than half an hour later, whilst sat on a cliff top eating my lunch, a Lancaster bomber escorted by two Spitfires flew past.  Timeslip or nearby airshow? 

You know something?  Those skies stayed clear all the way back to Crapchester.  So, in future, don't just assume that because you are suffering fould weather locally, it must be just as miserable everywhere else - get off your backside and go South.  (Unless you are on the South coast already, obviously).