So, just how cold and windy is it actually in the Love Island villa? An investigation

When this year’s Winter Love Island contestants got the call to say they were being flown out to South Africa they were probably buzzing. Eight weeks escaping January British weather in place of sunning themselves by the pool. Balmy nights, a gentle breeze— an all round dreamy start to the season.

But as soon as Love Island 2023 kicked off, viewers began to notice this warm weather dream might not actually be the case for contestants when it comes to evenings around the fire pit. Farmer Will has noticeably been wearing Ugg boot slippers with his chinos every night. Maya Jama joked there was some “massive wind machine action” going on as she clung to her thigh split dress for dear life while introducing the competition’s first bombshell. People are shivering. They have goosebumps.

“I’m sorry but they all look freezing in this wind, may as well be set in the UK,” pointed out one fan on Twitter. “They wanna wear their coats mate. #LoveIsland…get these people indoors they are freezing,” added another.

But just how cold is it in the Love Island villa right now? Isn’t South Africa meant to be in the middle of summer? Well, the new boujee villa is on a 25-acre estate called Ludus Magnus, which is in Franschhoek, near Cape Town. And, according to the most precise weather reading you can get (AccuWeather) that means Love Islanders are dealing with lows of 17 degrees at night in combination with savage 30km/h gusts of wind.

Image via Accuweather

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For reference, in 40km gusts it’s windy enough to move large tree branches. In 30km, small trees are swaying side to side and bare minimum you’re obv going to need a cardigan. Yet, these girls are huddling for warmth in nothing but strappy stillettos and Oh Polly dresses— God truly does give his toughest fights to his strongest soldiers.

And it turns out it might still be too cold even for any of the contestants to swim. In previous summer seasons, contestants have revealed they’ve never gotten in the villa’s pool in Spain because it’s so cold. “We went into the villa at the end of May and it’s just about getting in to summer, the pool hasn’t been heated or anything,” Kady McDermott told Ok!

Seemingly, the same rule will apply to the winter Love Island season because, in South Africa, summer only started on 21 December, meaning the new villa’s humungous Olympic level pool has only had just under four weeks to heat up in the intermittent sun. Blanket, anyone?

Love Island 2023 continues at 9pm on ITV2 and ITVX. For all the latest Love Island news and gossip and for the best memes and quizzes, like The Holy Church of Love Island on Facebook.

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• Inside the cringe and hilarious TikTok accounts of the winter Love Island 2023 cast

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