November-January have among the lowest Google search interest of the year for Northern Michigan. Forecasts for both peninsulas are higher than last year. Weather forecasts are warmer than normal but with higher precipitation. Based on these forecasts, snow coverage is probable for at least a significant part of December (especially the Upper Peninsula) and all of January. This would be a welcome change for snow sports from last year.

Nonetheless, we can expect temperature forecasts to become less reliable in the winter. Normally, temperature forecasts show more variance in the winter and precipitation shows more variance in the summer. Even in October, the variance between forecast and actuals for temperature was much higher than during the summer.

Actual values for the Upper Peninsula are lower than forecasts as with the rest of the year. This situation will hopefully reconcile itself next year unless search interest continues to trend downward. That’s because next year’s forecast will use this year’s values as last actuals.