Easter comes early this year, thanks to the byzantine way the early church decided on its due date. For the hard-pressed British tourist industry, this is not good news. When Easter comes early, so received wisdom suggests, people stay at home, or fly abroad; only when it comes late, in mid or even towards the end of April, do they head to the British countryside, beaches and other outdoor attractions.

On average, given that the date of Easter Sunday can vary by more than a month, a later Easter is likely to be sunnier and warmer than an early one. The records show that the warmest on record was in 2011, when temperatures on 23 April, Holy Saturday, reached almost 28C in Surrey. Likewise, the sunniest Easters were in 1984 and 2014, when the sun shone all day – more than 14 hours in parts of Scotland, during the weekend of 19-20 April.

The coldest Easter was indeed early – 31 March 2013 – when the temperature fell to -12.5C in the Scottish Highlands. But the wettest was quite late, on Sunday 14 April 1963, when almost 150mm of rain fell in Snowdonia.