Late Summer or Early Fall?

Last night the temperatures already dropped to 5° C. I love it of course because for this reason we have extremely pleasant temperatures during the day, despite the unclouded sunshine. To make it perfect, there is also a cool breeze. Everything seems to call: "put on the mountain boots boys and girls and enjoy the perfect weather in nature!", a call I of course gladly heed.

I somehow feel that there will be a severe winter this year and it will probably start earlier than usual. But besides my gut feeling, there are other indications. For example, they say that the winter will be severe if the rowan trees bear a lot of fruit. And they do this year, and they were ripe earlier than usual.

We were among the lucky ones up here, because we had some rain from time to time. But some plants have wilted earlier than in other years, and it now looks almost like it usually does in three or four weeks – despite the rain.

I have talked to experienced locals who are also expecting an early, severe winter this year, and they point to the same signs in nature as I do. But I don't want to claim that it will really happen like that, although many signs point to it. We will see...