Hallo,
Could anyone find me the weather stats for Paris, France in January, 1997?
I was there that year and remember it being very cold. My friends keep
telling me Paris is never really cold.
Thank you,
Can
PS: is the category I chose OK?

Hello can1972-ga

Thank-you for your question.

The weather statistics for Paris, France can be searched using the
excellent Wunderground.com website and using their historical data.  A
direct link is given below:

http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/LFPG/1997/1/1/DailyHistory.html?req_city=NA&req_state=NA&req_statename=NA

To look through the rest of the month simply alter the date at the top of the page.

I have looked through the month of January for you and it appears that
January 1st was the coldest day.  On average it was 12°F/-11°C with a
high of 15°F/-9°C and a low of 8°F/-13°C.

The monthly averages for January 1997 can be viewed here:
http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/LFPG/1997/1/1/MonthlyHistory.html?req_city=NA&req_state=NA&req_statename=NA

Note that the mean temperature for that month was 32°F/0°C.

Obviously temperature is a subjective thing depending on where you are
from; a scientist resident at the South Pole may consider the
temperatures on 1st January positively balmy but I would suggest that
a resident of Paris would find them *much* colder than average.  The
overall mean temperature for the month though I would suggest is "not
too cold".

I hope this data helps with your discussion with your friends.

Should you require any further assistance on this subject please do
not hesitate to ask for clarification.

Thank you very much. I just forwarded the links to the 'friend'. I am
sure he will beleive me now. I also remembered that I had an
incredibly difficult time flying in on 2 January and almost not making
it to my accounting exams the next day.
Thanks very much.
Can

Thanks for the 5-star rating and tip!  They are both appreciated.

Just to add some personal experience to palitoy's stats, my wife and I
vist Paris from London fairly frequently, and generally find the
weather in the two cities about the same. In particular, in both the
weather is erratic and hard to predict. For example, some years ago,
we spent the whole month of August in Paris, and it was very sunny and
warm, with sultry evenings. A few years later, again we were due to
spend the month there, and remembering the previous occasion I
suggested to my wife that we didn't need to take jackets or top coats.
In fact, we did take them, and weren't we glad! It was wet and chilly
almost every day - with the beach the Paris authorities had laid
beside the Seine almost deserted! As for Parisien winters, if you read
Hemingway's "A Moveable Feast", a memoir of his early days in Paris, I
think you'll find he describes them as extremely cold, though perhaps
that was as much to do with inadequate indoor heating as the outside
temperature.