Hot April weather brought crowds to Thetis Lake

WATCH: After a gloomy start to April, Tuesday’s hot weather had people feeling like its summer time. Especially in the West Shore where temperatures hit 20 degrees Celsius. As Luisa Alvarez shows us, Thetis Lake was crawling with people eager to enjoy it before the rain returns this weekend.

Temperatures in the West Shore and around Greater Victoria hit the 20 C mark, making Tuesday the hottest day of the year thus far.

Many were eager to enjoy the weather and flocked to Thetis Lake, especially those visiting from other provinces who welcomed the sun with open arms.

“We have snow in our yard and its snowing and grey and wet so it’s quite a change this is perfect,” said Paul Nielsen.

“I’m from Alberta so this is like summer for us,” said Nicholas Jones.

While not quite summer yet, Ed Wiebe, a scientific assistant with the University of Victoria, says what people may not know is that this April weather does have some summer similarities.

“A sunny week in April has the same amount of solar energy as the sunny week in mid to second to the third week in August,” said Wiebe.

In order to collect data on these sunny days, scientists use a tool called the Campbell-Stokes Recorder.

“The glass sphere focuses the sun’s light from any direction onto a sheet of paper,” said Wiebe “It literally burns a track onto a sheet of paper when the sun is out.”

With the sheet of paper, scientists collect data on temperature and climate in an area.

In parts of the West Shore, the data shows temperatures are even warmer than in the city.

Wiebe says it because it feels less influence from the ocean.

“Parts of it are quite a bit higher altitude than the rest of Greater Victoria and it tends to not have the strong onshore breezes from the cooler ocean to lower the temperatures,” said Wiebe.

The hot weather will hold up for the next few days but be sure to have your umbrella handy for the weekend.

“We are in a sort of a large scale high-pressure zone right now but its giving way to some clouds and rain coming up this weekend,” said Wiebe.

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