Australian summer begins decisively in . It is a month of stark contrasts. While the rest of the world associates December with snow and hearth-fire, Australia associates it with bitumen shimmering in heatwaves and the high-pitched drone of cicadas. The month is anchored by Christmas, a surreal affair for the uninitiated, where images of Santa Claus in a thick red suit clash with 35-degree Celsius (95°F) heat. The traditional heavy roasts are increasingly abandoned for seafood platters and backyard barbecues, celebrated not by candlelight but under the prolonged twilight of a late sunset.
On Christmas Day, the sun was a hammer. They ate prawns and cold ham under the striped shade of a beach umbrella, the sand so hot it blistered the soles of your feet if you stood still too long. His little sister, Milla, built a sandcastle while wearing nothing but a sunhat and a streak of zinc on her nose. The surf was a relentless, turquoise muscle, and when Leo finally dove into a wave, the shock of cold was a holy thing. summer months for australia