The link in the 5 day weather reports section(bottom of page) - The Synoptic map link seems to be out of money and cant supply a map any more, is it possible we can change this link to a site that actually works?, just maybe? It is actually a very helpful tool.

Can do, any particular chart you prefer ??

- http://www.weatherphotos.co.za
- http://www.koolasun.co.za/weather/sa-weather-chart.html

Also what is the preferred site for weather? Weatherspark vs accuweather.com

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Climb ZA - Administrator

How about posting both
- http://www.weatherphotos.co.za
- http://www.koolasun.co.za/weather/sa-weather-chart.html
The weather photos seems like more of a general feel for overall conditions and the koolsun actually displays the synoptic map.

Preferred weather site is accuweather.

weathersa.co.za is still the most accurate source of weather forecasting. all the other local and international web sites just copy and paste and reformat to make it look a little bit more presentable. it's 'the horses mouth', so to speak.

some people swear by windguru, etc. but the guy sitting at a keyboard in the czech republic just copies and pastes weathersa info and the US navy ww swell models.

having said that the weathersa people have just changed their look and feel and i think it's a step backwards.
synoptic chart is a bit hidden: http://metzone.weathersa.co.za/images/articles/ma_sy.gif

robert i'm not sure where you get your behind-the-scenes insights from but clearly you have not been comparing the websites in real life. in my humble experience windguru has been far superior to weathersa. 3-hourly forecasts a full week in advance; continuous updates; forecast models that are far more advanced than weathersa's and ultimately forecasts that are a lot more accurate. all my surfing buddies swear by windguru - that should also be a strong cue

I was under the impression that accuweather was running their own prediction software and was not a copy paste from weathersa. Windguru might be a copy paste but its seems far more detailed than what you get from weathersa in my opinion.

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Fat men are harder to kidnap

http://www.yr.no/ is the best weather site. (IMHO of course)

It is more accurate and has a nicer look than windguru and accuweather (both of which are very good too)

Weathersa is crap

Yup, I'm with Mok on this one.
Windguru is about 99% accurate 100% of the time. I swear by it. It will predict precipitation accurately to about half an hour....sometimes to the minute. Most people get scared off by all the different arrows, colours, precip etc, but it is very easy to understand.
I swear by it as it will be be 100% spot two days in advance of whatever outdoor trip you are planning.
As It's a Kitesurfing website the only inland area it has is the Vaal dam so not much use for the folk in JHB.

Windguru has inland places too. Use "spot search" to find them. Here is Waterval Boven for instance
http://www.windguru.cz/int/index.php?sc=121196

You can also create custom forecasts for any place you like.

Windguru is a great website, but yr.no is better (especially for rain forecasts). Here is the yr.no forecast for Boven:
http://www.yr.no/place/South_Africa/Mpumalanga/Waterval_Boven/long.html

i normally check windguru; accuweather and weathersa. i then pick the forecast that i would like to happen

This was sent to me via email:

Although the website is Norwegian, they have a remote weather station set up along the walk in path to the MCSA Krom River hut in the Du Toits Kloof mountains that uploads data every three hours. By far the most accurate data for hiking and climbing in these mountains (click on the hour by hour forecast).

http://www.yr.no/place/South_Africa/Wes ... oits_Kloof

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Climb ZA - Administrator

It took a while but we have updated out weather links to point to http://www.yr.no
Thanks for all the suggestions.

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Climb ZA - Administrator

In my experience, Windguru is the most accurate because it can be site-specifically calibrated. So, if you're climbing at Pinnacle Gorge, the Windguru forcast will be subtly different from the YR forcast which will be for Steytlerville (60kms off). We all know that mountain environments are micro-climatic, and as such, a site-specific calibration is more useful, especially if the mega-trends (and YR is good for this) suggest general instability.

www.freemeteo.com
You can narrow the position down to something as remote as Truitjieskraal, or Du Toits Kloof Pass. Do yourselves a favour and check it out. 3-hourly weather forecasts up to a week in advance.
Better than Accuweather or Weathersa.
I have tried Windguru, but it doesn't include non-coastal areas.
I've tried YR as well, but must say I prefer Freemeteo.
My 2c

Don't know about Eastern Cape, Keith, but in the Western Cape, certainly, you can get an impressively intense coverage of places on YR. For example several different points at different altitudes in the Du Toits Kloof Mountains alone. Can't see that it would be different in Eastern Cape. The trick though is to find them. The only way I know how is to search by name, and they might be listed under an arbitrary farm name, ie not under Du Toits Kloof. One would think that you should be able to search by geographical position, but I haven't yet found a way to do that. If anybody knows how, please share. I do think that YR is the superior weather site.

@johannlanz yr.no uses GeoNames for its locations. If you go to http://www.geonames.org/maps/showOnMap and zoom in, you can be sure to find a GeoName close to your desired location. Search yr.no for the GeoName (and note the GeoName ID which appears in the yr.no url if there are multiple places with the same name, such as Rocklands).

@tygereye Windguru does indeed show non-coastal areas. See comments above. But as johannlanz says, yr.no is superior (even though windguru is excellent).

@keithjames This url provides a better Pinnacle Gorge forecast than Steytlerville (if Pinnacle Gorge is where I think it is).
http://www.yr.no/place/South_Africa/Eas ... ge_Rivier/
Here it is on a map
https://maps.google.no/maps?ie=UTF8&hl= ... +Rivier%29

@justin How about having locations closer to the climbing areas?
For instance
http://www.yr.no/place/South_Africa/Wes ... /long.html or
http://www.yr.no/place/South_Africa/Wes ... /long.html
instead of Clanwilliam

Thanks Keith - this is great to have found a way to locate yr sites.