White Christmas not in the cards for Athens

Athenians hoping for a white Christmas are unlikely to see their wishes come true, as the Greek capital - or most of the country for that matter - rarely see snow in December, data from the Athens Observatory show.

From 1930 and to the present, Athens saw snow on Christmas Eve only in 1962 and 1992, and on Christmas Day only in 1949 and 1968. The sole Boxing Day with snow in the Greek capital was in 1991, a good year for winter romantics, as it snowed on eight different days.

"Athens has been getting 0.4 days of snow in December over the course of decades, which means that it may get one day of snow this month every two-and-a-half years," says meteorologist Dimitris Ziakopoulos.

Thessaloniki and Florina, in northern Greece, get an average of 1.2 and 5.9 snowy December days respectively, the expert says, warning that this does not mean warm temperatures in those...