Alberta, Manitoba, Saskatchewan:

The Prairies, the Canadian extension from the US’s Great Plains, which includes parts of Saskatchewan and Manitoba, sees long snowy winters and short, briefly warm, summers, with the potential for huge temperature swings across the year.

Manitoba is a province of extremes, both across the year and across the province as a whole. Cold, dry winters, although with snow, typify the north of Manitoba, whereas it’s warmer, but wetter and more humid further south. In all parts, average daytime maximum temperatures swing by 40 degrees C through the year. Of the Prairies provinces, Manitoba is the wettest, with most rain falling in the summer. The summer storms can be intense, and often develop into thunderstorms. In fact 3/4ths of all tornadoes in Canada occur across the Prairies.

In Saskatchewan’s capital Regina average daytime highs swing from minus double digits in winter to the mid to high twenties in the summer. It’s a fairly dry province, but take note that June is Regina’s wettest month.

Average summer temperatures in this part of the world might be in the 20sC, but it can get a lot hotter. Canada’s warmest day on record was in 1937, when Midale and Yellowgrass, both in the south of Saskatchewan, each recorded 45ºC.