What a difference a week makes! From slipping in the snow to sunbathing on the beach in 12 days

-Temperatures expected to remain higher than average into next week
-Yesterday was 10C higher than the norm for this time of year
-18.7C was highest temperature, recorded in Warwickshire

By PAUL SIMS

Winter wonderland: Holbeach in Lincolnshire was under snow on February 11

Judging by the startling difference, you would imagine these photographs were taken months apart.
In fact, it was a little over a week.
Just 12 days after shivering in -15.6C (3.9F) – the country’s coldest temperature of the winter – Holbeach in Lincolnshire was yesterday basking in 17.7C (64F).

Spring sunshine: Just 12 days later the same scene is bathed beneath the blue skies

The colossal 33.3C temperature swing was reflected in similar scenes played out elsewhere in the country, demonstrating that in Britain nothing changes quite like the weather.
Snow and ice has been replaced by blue skies, sunshine and temperatures rivalling the Mediterranean and parts of Africa.
The unseasonably warm weather spread from Bournemouth, where sun-seekers hit the beach, to the Midlands and beyond.

Coleshill, Warwickshire, recorded the highest temperature, of 18.7C (65.7F), while in Kew Gardens, West London, it was 17.1C (62.8F).
In Cambridge people took to punting on the River Cam as the city basked in temperatures 12C higher than the February average of 6C (43F).
The sunshine even brought spring crocuses into bloom.

What a difference: Woodland in Cambridge, February 5, when snow covered the ground, and, right the same spot pictured yesterday
Met Office forecaster Sarah Holland said: ‘The wind has changed direction and is blowing from the south-west, bringing very mild weather from the Azores.
'This also means that we have a lot of cloud across the country, but this breaks up the further east you are.’ Temperatures are expected to remain higher than average over the weekend and into next week.
The warmest February day on record was February 13, 1998, when Greenwich, South-East London, hit 19.7C (67.5F).

source: dailymail