Chasing HUGE thunderstorms… on foot
Somewhere in the south of France under the scorching heat of yet another record-breaking Heat Wave is where our little adventure begins although this terrible heat Dome was turning roads into serpents or Mt lava and the Landscapes into perfect fuel for the next uncontrollable forest fires it was also giving us a
Purpose you see when this exceptional Heat Wave combines with the warm humid air coming from the Mediterranean up the slopes of the San mountains some of the most violent and long-lasting storms known to man can occur and I was hoping to get a front row seat that is formidable
Phenomenon the start of our trip was spent hopping from water hole to water hole in a desperate attempt to not be cooked alive in the 40° C weather once we deemed ourselves refreshed enough we resumed hitchhiking encouraged by the wise words left by countless iters before us
Later the afternoon brought us our first glimpse of the formidable clouds that were growing we hoped into spectacular Thunderstorms on the morning of day two we decided to hike up to some desolate plateaus from which we may be able to witness the formation of some small Thunderstorms along the way we stopped for yet another swim in the river as the sun was still beating down on every creature mercilessly well except for the fish of Course After reaching the top of these deserted Landscapes we spotted some promising looking clouds while they developed into a proper thunderstorm I noticed something quite peculiar about them they seem to be completely stationary this is quite unusual as thunderstorms usually move in a straight line and pass over
You in a matter of a few minutes in some cases but these ones were almost perfectly still this gave us the opportunity to witness the storm forming from afar get under it catch a few Lightnings and finally try to get behind it as fast as we could to capture some
Beautiful shots of the cumulus clouds in the sunset oh Man the San mountains in France happen to be just a a little bit north of the Mediterranean Sea which under the right conditions blows a constant stream of warm humid air towards the San the mountains then send all of this hot and moist air higher up into the atmosphere
Where it cools down and may form huge thunderstorms waiting to dissipate their energy in the form of torrential rains and Lightnings the thing is most thunderstorms tend to dissipate their energy after a few hours but not so here in this event you see while all of this is going on the Mediterranean is still pushing large packets of warm humid air towards us which can keep these thunderstorms going for
Days now just one thing of note thunderstorms are rather unpredictable and yes this is definitely going to come back to bite Us in the ass so the news is not good I had a look at uh the weather forecast and uh basically yesterday they had predicted that it would be thunderstorms all afternoon
Uninterrupted and I was very happy but today the weather forecast has changed and now it’s basically going to be Sunshine all afternoon including tomorrow in the afternoon distant sounds of rumbling Thunder got our hopes back up after discussing with the locals which Hill would make the best viewing
Spot to admire the incoming storm we set up for the Wait unfortunately a thunderstorm did eventually happen but probably some 80 km or so from where we were as a testimony to how intense the storm was we got to witness the formation of what is called nova shooting top which is what happens when the hot Rising air
Masses contain so much energy that they rise so quickly and punch through the cloud ceiling and spew all over the place like a pot of water boiling Over I must admit at the time I was a little bit disappointed but upon reviewing this footage I’m not so sure anymore anyway at the time the good company and the fact that the adventure was not over yet chased these bad feelings away pretty quickly hello everyone and welcome to
The least populated Department of France Lo yes so we are in a place called Lo and we’re going to try to go back to Brussel because I have um a very important appointment that I cannot miss in a few days consequence of the fact that this is the least populated Department of
France there hasn’t been a single Fu car in I don’t know 30 minutes something like that is the sound of weather of the sound of a car we are crazy on my long Okay the man in the car was explaining that believe it or not his destination was Brussel which is just absolutely amazing if you think about it but unfortunately he was going back Tomorrow at the end of a long day of hitchhiking we decided to try our luck asking for random strangers to sleep on their couch unfortunately I must say rarely did I ever encounter so many people just bluntly refusing to even hear us which is totally fair but quite
Exhausting morally in the end luck smiled and a very nice professional parachutist agreed to let her sleep on their Couch the next day seeing how much time this was taking us and how exhausted we were after spending days sleeping in the bushes and walking around under the heat we decided to book one of the rare right chairs that completely overpriced all in all despite not witnessing the grand
Spectacle I was hoping for my passion for extreme weather phenomena was only renewed and I cannot wait to be back outside chasing storms or going on other crazy Adventures Again
in today’s adventure, we try to chase a huge thunderstorm on foot. follow us as we explore the south of France in an attempt to witness one of mother Nature’s most formidable spectacles.