North Carolina
Summer temperatures in Cape Hatteras hit an average high of 85 degrees in July, which offers plenty of opportunities to visit the impressive Atlantic Ocean beaches and wildlife refuge. January's average low is 39 degrees. "If I had retired in the USA, and based only on weather and leaving out the west coast, Asheville would have been my choice," says Peter Robinson, an emeritus geography professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill who is now retired in the UK.
Oregon
Temperatures range from an average low of about 33 degrees in January to an average high of 82 degrees in July in Eugene and Salem. Astoria is generally cooler in the summer (67 degrees) and slightly warmer in the winter (37 degrees).
Puerto Rico
San Juan has a tropical climate that can get very humid in the summer, with an average high of 87 degrees in July. It doesn't cool down much in the winter in this Caribbean island city. January's average low temperature is a pleasant 71 degrees.
South Carolina
Hot summers are common in Charleston, which has a semi-tropical climate. July's average high temperature is 89 degrees, but winters cool down significantly to an average low of 42 degrees.
Texas
Winters are mild in Galveston, where the average January low is a pleasant 50 degrees. Summer can be sweltering, with an average high in July of 89 degrees. John Nielsen-Gammon, an atmospheric sciences professor at Texas A&M University and the Texas State Climatologist, recommends the South Texas coast, from Corpus Christi to Brownsville. "The area is far enough south that it avoids many of the cold-air outbreaks that plague the rest of the central and eastern United States, and it's also along the main path of tropical Atlantic air flowing northward into North America," he says. "This means that the South Texas coast almost always has a decent breeze blowing, even in summertime, making its summer climate similar to that of a Caribbean island."
Washington
Seattle's legendary rainfall is largely confined to the winter months. The city averages just five days of precipitation in both July and August. Most places in Washington have fairly cool summers, with July's average high of 75 in Seattle and just 68 in Quillayute. January lows in both cities are in the mid-30s.
Of course, not every retiree wants to live in a place with placid weather. Some may find the change of seasons and large shifts in weather interesting, and feel like something is missing without them. Nielsen-Gammon has no intention of retiring somewhere with year-round pleasant weather. "I'd much rather be entertained by the weather," he says, suggesting that he might prefer witnessing 50-knot wintertime gales on the Oregon coast, thunderstorms in South Florida, tornado-producing supercells forming over the Rocky Mountains in Colorado, or the steady accumulation of lake-effect snow in Michigan. "Now those would be good weather destinations for retirees," he says.
Twitter: @aiming2retire
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