Cafe customers sit outside in Copenhagen on a June day.
Photographer: Carsten Snejbjerg/BloombergTourists Escape to Cooler Scandinavia Instead of Europe’s Hottest Spots
As southern Europe swelters in extreme heat exacerbated by climate change, travelers are increasingly seeking cooler summer vacations in Scandinavia.
Planning his graduation trip to Europe, Jaeger Lajewski pondered Italy’s renaissance buildings and Greece’s ancient monuments. But with those places now even hotter and more humid than his native New Jersey, he went for less traditional Scandinavia.
“We wanted to go somewhere a little bit cooler and more temperate,” the architecture graduate from University of Virginia says while milling around the ferries that take tourists out to the Stockholm archipelago. “Going to Italy, Greece or Croatia would have been really, really hot as well. And we wanted to see something different. We haven’t really explored this region of Europe before.”