Looking from outside it is easy to think that Paraguay does not really have seasons but it instead varying degrees of hot all year round. That though is not quite the case as the year is broken down into four quite distinct seasons.
The truly hot part of the year, summer has just come to an end.
Summer which starts building in mid November and then runs though until mid February is almost from start to finish very hot. The temperature hovers in the high 30s centigrade with spells in excess of 40 far from uncommon.
It is not time of year for rushing around. A time when shade and ice cold drinks are necessities. Schools take their long summer break and the pace of life slows as the land adjusts to the heat.
It is not all blue skies and buring sun however. For summer is also the time of intense tropical downpours as the weight of water evaporated from the land becomes too much for the sky to bare and great electrical storms tear across the land bringing with them damaging winds and flash floods.
These storms may last for a day or more darkening the sky and cutting of electricity. Once they have passed however the water drains away, the ground dries and then within a couple of days all is baked dry leaving little sign of the recent deluge.
Something else that marks summer out is how little temperatures drop once night arrives. This is the time of longest daylight giving the ground many hours to build up heat before the sun sets.
Once it does the temperature may drop by as little as two or three degrees making a summer night a hot and sticky one where relief can only be bought with a fan or air conditioner.
By February the joy of awaiting another long hot day is long past and the land looks forward to the arrival of autumn.
The first sign that autumn has arrived is not a cooling of the day. An early autumn day is not that different to a late summer day. Instead it is the cooling of the nights that marks the arrival of autumn.
Gone are the hot sticky nights replaced by ones that seem almost cool in comparison. As the autumn sun sets heat evaporates into the darkening air leaving a cooler, fresher land behind.
The change between seasons is always sudden and some years taking no more than a couple of nights. As autumn progresses the nights become cooler and longer when winter starts to approach.
This is a freshing time of year. The sky is clear and blue. The excesses of summer are over making it the season to do all those jobs which could not be done in high summer.
The bright days are far for cold. Generally in the low to mid 30s, but the humidity has gone and the air is far drier. Autumn is a very pleasent time of year.
Less humidity means less moisture to build into storms. There are still storms for in Paraguay an electrical storm is possible any time of year.
At times the rain will arrive in the form of a front of cold weather rolling up from the south. A cold front is liable to blanket the sky in thick grey cloud for a few days, cooling and soaking the ground below it. These weather systems hint at what winter may bring once autumn is over and gone.
With the cooling and the decrease in rain though autumn the plants and trees start shutting down, dropping leaves and showing the last of their flowers preparing for the cold winter nights ahead.
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