Bridge to Sommaroy under the summer midnight sun in Tromso, Norway\u2014coolcations, taking a summer holiday in the northern hemisphere away from the hotter areas, are gaining in popularity.<\/p>\n
getty<\/p>\n
As climate change drives record temperatures across Europe<\/a> and the U.S. this summer, travelers are beginning to rethink the traditional summer vacation. The search for a cool location is reshaping where\u2014and when\u2014people choose to travel, but it isn\u2019t the only factor in play, so it may take time for behaviors to fully change.<\/p>\n This Summer, Europe And The U.S. Have Seen The Highest Recorded Temperatures <\/p>\n On a Tuesday in June, France recorded its highest average temperature ever\u2014an event symptomatic of a summer that has seen some of the highest temperatures. CNN<\/a> reports that July was the hottest month in the U.S. since records began in 1895.<\/p>\n By August, after five consecutive heat waves, the EU\u2019s climate monitoring service Copernicus announced the hottest June-to-July period on record, as reported by The New York Times<\/a>. The average temperature of 21.62\u00b0C\u20142.79\u00b0C above average\u2014was higher than the previous record set in 2022.<\/p>\n This Extreme Heat Changes Our Behavior, Including Around Vacations<\/p>\n A new poll<\/a> from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs highlights just how far extreme heat impacts many of our daily decisions and activities\u2014sleep, exercise, energy bills and work. The poll also highlights that 42% of U.S. adults report that extreme heat has affected their travel or vacation plans over the last year, up from 26% in July 2024.<\/p>\n Sensible Weather, a provider of weather guarantees for the travel and hospitality industry, recently surveyed 600 U.S. leisure travelers for its Weather Uncertainty & the Modern Traveler Report<\/a>. The poll found that bad weather was the second-highest concern for those surveyed (ranking above safety and flight disruptions and second only to cost). These findings underscore how much weather can influence travel decisions.<\/p>\n Going further, the expat insurance platform, Feather, ran a poll of 2,000 people across the U.K., France, Germany and Italy in late June, during the heatwaves. It found that climate is now a named reason people are considering leaving their country. The sample is small, but 21% of French people polled said that extreme weather has made them more open to living abroad, the highest of the four markets, and 16% of Britons polled said the same.<\/p>\n People Aren\u2019t Yet Skipping The Warmer EU Destinations This Summer<\/p>\n The Mediterranean beaches currently feel far from empty. The statistics show that Asian travelers have continued to visit Europe<\/a> in their numbers despite soaring temperatures and forest fires across parts of the continent.<\/p>\n CNBC<\/a> reports that searches for European destinations by Asian travelers rose 57% year-on-year during the July-August travel season. And Edmund Ong, senior regional director, Southeast Asia, at Trip.com,<\/a> told CNBC that there were also improved conversion rates from searches to bookings. <\/p>\n But Interest In Coolcations Is Warming Up<\/p>\n Coolcations<\/a> are not a new phenomenon amid the climate crisis, but their popularity is rising. While France, Spain and Italy remain firm favorites, CNBC reports an increased interest in cooler destinations, such as Norway, Iceland, Finland and the Dolomites.<\/p>\n Euronews reports supporting data that coolcations are becoming more popular. The French version of Hotels.com<\/a> saw a 246% increase in searches for rooms in Copenhagen, the Danish capital, since the first French heatwave in May, and searches from France rose by 151% for Dublin.<\/p>\n And while it seems obvious to holidaymakers looking to escape the heat that one should travel north of perennial Mediterranean favorites, Holafly, the provider of traveler eSims, has put together a top ten of places that don\u2019t just offer colder temperatures, but it also ranked places based on climate relief, accessibility, traveler interest, visitor experience, and value, so it takes more of the entirety of the travel experience into account. <\/p>\n The Global Cool Escape Index<\/a> identifies the top destinations offering the best overall coolcation experience worldwide for summer 2026:<\/p>\n These destinations will be worth looking into for summer 2027. Alfonso Mata, Head of Strategy at Holafly, says of the index that \u201cextreme heat is no longer just a minor inconvenience; it\u2019s actively reshaping global travel patterns and booking decisions.”<\/p>\n Europe Is The Fastest-Warming Continent, So This Trend Will Continue<\/p>\n It seems the most accurate conclusion for 2026 is that summer travel in the Northern Hemisphere may be showing early signs of diversification due to extreme heat. <\/p>\n And that\u2019s because temperature isn\u2019t the only factor when booking a holiday. Price plays an important role, and the simple fact is that many places in Southern Europe are much cheaper than Northern Europe. In addition, many of these warming Mediterranean countries are better equipped than others in terms of tourist infrastructure because they\u2019ve been welcoming so many visitors for so many years.<\/p>\n The climate, cost and infrastructure are not the only factors at play for future summers, either. European overtourism will discourage visitors year on year, for sure. And shoulder seasons are getting longer in Mediterranean destinations\u2014they used to be May and September, and now it\u2019s much more agreeable in terms of crowds and temperatures in March and October in southern Europe.<\/p>\n It remains to be seen how quickly the trend shifts, but it is clear that coolcations are more likely as southern Europe becomes increasingly uncomfortable in August.<\/p>\n MORE FROM FORBESForbesHow To Move Or Retire To SpainBy Alex Ledsom<\/a>ForbesWhy Bulgaria’s 2026 Digital Nomad Visa Is Worth ConsideringBy Alex Ledsom<\/a>Forbes3 Destination Dupes For Europe\u2019s Most Crowded HotspotsBy Alex Ledsom<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bridge to Sommaroy under the summer midnight sun in Tromso, Norway\u2014coolcations, taking a summer holiday in the northern…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1146593,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5174],"tags":[2311,311774,311773,2000,299,5187,36,1115,43259,1017],"class_list":["post-1146592","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-eu","tag-climate-change","tag-climate-change-europe","tag-cooler-summer-vacations","tag-eu","tag-europe","tag-european","tag-france","tag-norway","tag-southern-europe","tag-u-s"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/117089375781154644","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1146592","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1146592"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1146592\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1146593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1146592"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1146592"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1146592"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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