16

I am looking for a word or a discourse for a place with a lot wind if any exists in English.

“We had a hard time on ______(s)”.

Some languages (i.e. Turkish) already have a common word for it. For instance, it is called anafarta1 2 3 in Turkish. If "anafarta" was an English noun, we could have a sentence like that:

"We had a hard time on anafartas".

1
  • Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.
    – tchrist
    Aug 6, 2020 at 0:05

13 Answers 13

58

Not for the place as a noun. You would need to call it "windy"

exposed to or swept by the wind:

or "windswept"

open or exposed to the wind:

3
  • 3
    "exposed" by itself is a great adjective for this - somethign that is window is likely to be wet too, and exposed to whatever's falling/blowing at the time.
    – Criggie
    Aug 3, 2020 at 5:12
  • 7
    @Criggie: Not really all that likely to be wet. Lots of windy places in the desert, and in the mountains, even when it's clear.
    – jamesqf
    Aug 3, 2020 at 5:20
  • 4
    Windswept is the word that occurred to me. It's usually associated with bleak, bare, desolate, isolated places.
    – gidds
    Aug 3, 2020 at 8:38
20

A place with a lot of wind is called a blowy or tempestuous place.

Blowy: Windy or windswept. [Lexico]

Example: We had a hard time in a blowy place.

Or try blustery.

Blustery: With strong winds. [Cambridge English Dictionary]

A blustery place.


5
  • 5
    bustery often has an overtone of things also being cold.
    – A.Ellett
    Aug 3, 2020 at 3:08
  • 16
    'blustery' is great, like in Winnie the Pooh. On the other hand 'blowy' sounds like a child's made-up word, adjectivizing a verb like a really cute alien would: "The high wind is making many tree branches break" -> "The tree branches are breaky".
    – Mitch
    Aug 3, 2020 at 14:06
  • @Mitch, Not necessary to always adjectivise a verb. 'Blow' could be a noun. As 'windy' is made up of a noun (wind) and a suffix -y. As for 'break', I'd use the suffix -able. Aug 3, 2020 at 14:10
  • 4
    @DecapitatedSoul 1) 'blow' for air is pretty rare as a noun, 2) I'm not saying it's not done, just that it sounds strange to do it with 'blow'. 3) I'm just giving additional nuance for future readers so they understand how to pick among the suggestions like a native speaker. If you want to sound like a 7 year old, use 'blowy', if you want to sound evocative, use 'blustery', if you want to be straightforward use 'windy'. Note that the OP is looking for a -noun- and all of these are adjectives.
    – Mitch
    Aug 3, 2020 at 14:21
  • 2
    I understand blustery to mean strong and variable/gusty winds, so a strong, steady wind wouldn't be blustery.
    – jamesqf
    Aug 4, 2020 at 4:27
14

Dialectically (Dictionary) and rather poetically one might say "wuthering place", if not over-worried about emulating Emily Brontë in her "Wuthering Heights", which has promulgated the term "wuthering" out of dialect towards making it a full English word, although not quite successfully as can be seen from the register "dialectical (British)" that it has retained and the still central association it has kept with the novel.

3
  • 42
    While this may be poetic, it will not be understood by most English speakers. Aug 3, 2020 at 2:47
  • 1
    would not be so sure. The Brontë novel, and the Genesis album Wind and Wuthering have contributed to spreading it beyond Britain. It was my first association when I saw this on HNQ.
    – dlatikay
    Aug 5, 2020 at 15:18
  • 3
    @dlatikay I've read the book (and participated in a mass re-enactment of the Kate Bush song!) but I had no idea "wuthering" meant "windy".
    – IMSoP
    Aug 5, 2020 at 17:18
11

"Wind tunnel" is often uses, somewhat metaphorically, to refer to a windy location.

Of course, technically a "wind tunnel" is a sort of large box through which air is blown in order to provide a controlled testing environment for aircraft parts and the like, but the term might well be used to describe a situation such as one where the wind blows through the space between two buildings. (A little less likely to be used for describing the wind in an open field.)

0
7

“We had a hard time on ______(s)”

There is no noun. However, let us suppose you are talking about a journey, e.g.

“We travelled on foot through the mountains. We had a hard time on the windy/windblown/windswept stretches.”

stretch

4a: an extent in length or area

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/stretch

6

Buffeted is another possibility. You might describe "the buffeted hillside", or more specifically "the wind-buffeted hillside". It might not apply as well to an open field. Could work for a coast or a shoreline as well. It can also be used to refer to a place that is buffeted by waves, but in this case you'd usually specify that, e.g. "the shoreline was buffeted by the encroaching sea" or the like. They sometimes go together, e.g. "The rocky shore, buffeted by wind and waves".

5

"Wind-ridden" is another adjective that can be used to insist on the unpleasantness of the windy conditions in a particular place although this characteristic of the term can be shifted, from applying to a place, to describing a situation associated to a place (example 2 below); as well, the unpleasantness that this word is supposed to communicate (given the meaning of "ridden"), is at times rather elusive (examples 1 and 4 below).

  • Love letter to dusty, isolated, wind-ridden … and beautiful Lubbock (example 1)

  • Nicole Davis and Hailey Lavarias scored the goals in a wind-ridden affair in Calgary.[…] From kickoff, the wind looked like it was going to be a defining factor for both teams. "The wind made it very difficult for both teams to get the ball moving," (example 2)

  • Nor is there a tree in sight, only a great sweep of rolling country, wind-ridden, under a chill sun, an emptiness that leaves no place to hide. (example 3)

  • NOW BEFORE HER in the seductive wind-ridden night, the wolf stood in dazzling moonlight. (example 4)

2
  • 3
    As a US-PNW native, I easily intuit the meaning of "wind-ridden" but I don't think I've ever heard or seen the term before. Aug 4, 2020 at 17:30
  • @Timbo Written with a hyphen, it is rather rare; the usual spelling is without hyphen. In that form you'll find a great many instances of its use here.
    – LPH
    Aug 4, 2020 at 17:35
3

Three excellent adjectives have already been suggested.

If you need a noun, then you could do worse than the moors or (hat tip to @jtlz2) wold, or talk about the windy [x] where [x] is hills, mountains, peaks or cliffs.

7
  • Or Wold - as in, Stow-on-the-Wold, where the wind blows cold...
    – jtlz2
    Aug 3, 2020 at 14:43
  • Yes! Thank you for the addition. Aug 3, 2020 at 14:50
  • Which three adjectives? There are now 12 different answers.
    – Mari-Lou A
    Aug 4, 2020 at 12:06
  • Not sure it matters, really! Mostly just context. I thought OP was looking for a NP, and although I thought the suggested adjectives were good I didn't think they really answered the question. Aug 4, 2020 at 12:10
  • FWIW, I think wuthering heightsis the best answer... Aug 4, 2020 at 12:11
0

In nautical terms, there is "the Roaring Forties" - the area between latitudes 40° and 50° south, and known for its strong winds. However, it is chiefly used literally or, rarely, as a metaphor/simile.

The Journal of a Disappointed Man: by W. N. P. Barbellion "January 26. Out of doors to-day it's like the roaring forties! Every tree I pass in the lane was a great wind instrument..."

5
  • 6
    This makes me think of the term “roaring 20s”, so I would simply have no idea what you were talking about if you used this.
    – Laurel
    Aug 3, 2020 at 10:03
  • 4
    This is a very obscure phrase for anyone who is not massively familiar with 19th-century sailing jargon. It just about made its way into the 20th century, in the same way as tall ships just about made their way into the 20th century. When tall ships stopped being a practical method of transportation, this phrase was similarly dead. Today it should be regarded as archaic.
    – Graham
    Aug 3, 2020 at 10:40
  • Definitely back in since around 1990, when Tracy Edwards skippered the all-female crew of Maiden in the Whitbread round-the-world race. The further South latitude you cross the Indian Ocean, the shorter and the windier: Roaring Forties, Furious Fifties and the Shrieking Sixties. Aug 3, 2020 at 15:19
  • 1
    @graham Maybe it is archaic in some parts of the world, but not for those of us who actually (still) live in the roaring forties, where the term is in common usage: weatherwatch.co.nz/content/… en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roaring_Forties Aug 5, 2020 at 4:51
  • It's not obscure to me - I think maybe it's obscure if you live in the northern hemisphere but living near the southern ocean it's a common phrase. Aug 5, 2020 at 5:01
0

The high bluffs above the coastline

We had a hard time walking up the bluff above the coastline due to the fierce winds we encountered

5
  • 6
    The word "bluff" describes the geological features of the coastline, not any hypothetical windy nature of the area at any given time. Aug 3, 2020 at 13:49
  • 2
    Yes I agree with you. I am going with the fact that High Bluffs make me think of windy places. it's indirect but might be useful say for a book Aug 3, 2020 at 14:01
  • 2
    you should make that distinction clear in your answer.
    – Grump
    Aug 4, 2020 at 15:33
  • @Asteroids w/ wings, bluffs are windy, by their very nature (and location). It would be hard to believe you if you claimed one wasn't, unless it were a very, very still day. Aug 4, 2020 at 22:49
  • @WillCrawford I acknowledge that but doesn't make every windy place a bluff Aug 5, 2020 at 13:03
0

I would suggest "maelstrom". It originally meant a whirlpool but it can be also used figuratively to capture the idea of turbulence, buffeting or chaos.

0

If the physical location is not important in the context of the sentence, a prepositional phrase such as "in the wind" or "with the wind" may be used as in "We had a hard time in the wind". Using "in the wind" would not necessarily imply that the wind was causing difficulty whereas "with the wind" would.

-2

There is a noun that could be used here, windward. It is usually used as an adjective (windward side, or windward island), but it could also be a noun, meaning "the side receiving the wind's force". With just a smidge of imagination we could extend its meaning to "a windy place".

2
  • 8
    I'm not convinced. This would lead to the OP's sentence being, “We had a hard time on windward(s)” - I would not understand this unless it was explained. Aug 3, 2020 at 9:24
  • 8
    Windward can be a noun, but it refers to a direction and not a place. You can travel windward like you can travel northward, but one cannot arrive at or pass through windward. Aug 3, 2020 at 14:56

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.