How many days until autumn?

Astronomical autumn begins at the September equinox, around 23 September, and in the Emirates it is the least convincing of the four seasonal markers. The calendar says the hot half of the year is over; the weather does not agree for another five or six weeks.

September is in practice the hardest month of the local year. The extreme heat of July and August has eased slightly, but the humidity on the coast is at its highest, which makes the evenings heavier than the daytime maximum suggests. The relief arrives suddenly rather than gradually, usually somewhere in the second half of October, when the first genuinely comfortable evening appears and the outdoor life of the country restarts within a week.

The equinox does coincide with something real, though: the school year is a month old by then, the summer travel season has finished, and the diary begins filling with the events that will run from October through to April. For a great many residents, the countdown to autumn is really a countdown to the point where it becomes possible to sit outside again, which is a matter of weeks rather than of a single date.

Once the equinox passes, the countdown starts running towards the following year's date.