Autumn begins but summer heat lingers in Portugal, catching tourists off guard

Autumn has arrived in Portugal, but the summer heat is still being felt. In Lisbon, 36 degrees surprised tourists who did not expect such atypical temperatures for this time of year. Autumn has begun, but summer is stubbornly hanging on, with much of Portugal still sweltering in unusual heat and thermometers reaching 40 degrees in some inland areas. In downtown Lisbon, tourists were caught off guard on Wednesday, the first day of autumn, by temperatures of 36 degrees. Expecting cooler weather in September, they had packed clothes for a milder climate. "I wasn’t expecting this heat. In fact, I even brought a coat because I thought it would be cooler and similar to Canadian autumn weather, around 21, 23 degrees Celsius, and I told my friend the same thing: 'Bring a coat'. And now I feel I’ve got slightly thicker socks than I would have brought if I’d known it was going to be this hot, to be honest," said Shamminaz Polen, a tourist from Canada visiting Lisbon. To avoid being out in the sun during the hottest hours, there are a few tricks that help these unprepared tourists. "First of all, we carry bottles of water. If there’s air conditioning, we go into a shop, do some shopping, or take a break to eat or drink something and then walk again. Another trick is to find an alleyway with shade and always walk on the shaded side of the pavement," the same tourist explained. "It’s very dry, obviously it’s quite pleasant here in the shade and in the shops and so on, but when you’re walking in the sun it can get really very hot," said Fletcher Shepard, another tourist from the United Kingdom on holiday in Lisbon. Despite the scorching heat, Fletcher Shepard still finds the warm weather pleasant for a few days while sightseeing, given that in England temperatures are currently hovering around 20 degrees Celsius. The Portuguese weather service IPMA has issued a heat warning for some regions of the country until the end of Thursday and local authorities have also warned of a high risk of forest fires in some inland areas. Temperatures are expected to fall slightly from next week.