Baby boomers and first-time travelers are shunning Europe’s summer hotspots in favor of 'coolcations'

Baby boomers and first-time travelers appear to be driving a so-called “coolcations” trend, shunning Europe’s peak summer hotspots in favor of cooler climes — such as the Nordic and Baltic countries.

Extreme summer heat, combined with cost and overcrowding concerns, are affecting where people choose to go on vacation.

For some, the appeal of booking a trip to Mediterranean destinations like Italy, Greece and Spain in July and August has lost its shine.

Instead, a growing wave of holidaymakers appears to be prioritizing summer trips to northern Europe to escape the blistering heat.

“If you go back to post-pandemic, 2022 and even into the summer of 2023, we saw southern Europe just be rife with popularity,” Intrepid Travel CEO James Thornton told CNBC over video call.

“It felt like everyone just had to go back to the Mediterranean, to Italy, to Greece, to Spain, because they hadn’t had the opportunity for a couple of years to be able to do that. What happened was, it was crowded, it was often expensive, and you were seeing various natural challenges happen — often as a result of climate change,” Thornton said.

“What we have seen in reverse is in 2024 and now into 2025, the demand for people wanting to travel in the peak of summer, in July and August, to what would traditionally be cooler northern European destinations,” he added.

For its U.K. customers, Thornton said Intrepid Travel had seen a 50% increase in travel bookings to Iceland, Estonia and Scandinavia for the July-August period, while bookings to southern Europe shifted to shoulder seasons.

Intrepid Travel’s bookings to Italy in April through June and September-October jumped 16%, while Greece bookings over the same respective periods rose by 37%.

Bookings to southern Europe for July-August, however, were down 15%, Thornton said, adding that he expects this trend to persist in the coming years.

“The days of the summer holiday to southern Europe seem as if they might be numbered,” Thornton said.

Notably, the two biggest drivers of this year’s coolcation trend were baby boomers — born between 1946 and 1964 — and first-time travelers aged 18 to 35-years-old, Intrepid Travel’s Thornton said.

“The growth is very much coming from baby boomers in their 50s and 60s. So, kids have left home, mortgage is paid off, more free time to go out and see the world and perhaps less affected by cost-of-living pressures,” Thornton said.

“The second group is actually at the opposite end of the scale, which is first-time travelers. So, for these people, they are young in their career, often driven by experiences over possessions and the reality of home ownership … is less relevant or maybe less achievable.”

Rome, Barcelona and Athens typically feature among Europe’s most popular summer destinations. But sweltering conditions in southern Europe have hit the summer travel season hard.

Last year, Europe endured its warmest summer on record, and campaigners have warned that record-breaking heat in March could fuel the conditions for harsher heat waves and wildfires over the coming months.

Jenny Southan, CEO of Globetrender, the world’s leading travel trend forecasting agency, said she expects the coolcation trend to intensify as the effects of climate change worsen and become more unpredictable.

“The trend for ‘coolcations’ reflects a conscious decision by a growing portion of consumers to avoid the most intense summer heat and wildfires that are occurring in certain parts of the world on an annual basis,” Southan told CNBC.

“Rather than shun hotspots in the Med completely, for example, they are travelling in spring and autumn, whereas in July and August, they opt for places such as Norway and Finland that are more temperate,” she added.

For northern European countries such as Sweden and Estonia, the burgeoning coolcations trend represents an economic opportunity.

A spokesperson at the marketing firm Visit Sweden said that, while coolcations might be considered “a new driving force,” it remains difficult to say whether they are the primary reason for any upswing in tourism.

“There are many driving forces in play when deciding on holiday type and holiday destination. We don’t have exact numbers on the size of the trend or where they come from. The trend, if it continues, is still at an early stage,” Visit Sweden said.

For its part, Estonia’s Tourist Board said it “certainly welcomes” a growing desire among holidaymakers to pursue cooler climes.

“We see this as more of a long-term trend, as other factors as well as temperature are also likely to affect consumer behavior, such as overtourism in some popular resorts and the growing desire to escape to more peaceful locations and reconnect with nature,” Anneli Lepp, director of Estonia’s Tourist Board, told CNBC.

Lepp said she doesn’t expect to see a mass movement of travelers seeking a traditional sunbathing beach vacation to book a trip to Estonia, noting that the Baltic country “tends to attract those seeking more active, hiking and outdoor adventurers.”

Globetrender’s Southan said that one of the benefits of travelers seeking milder temperatures during peak summer will be putting a stop to overcrowding in places that have previously been inundated by tourists.

“It will be a chance to reset and for economies to rebalance their year so that they aren’t working nonstop for four months (as they do in Ibiza and on many Greek Islands, for example). Instead, they will find ways to attract travellers throughout the year, providing a more sustainable source of income and putting less pressure on infrastructure,” Southan said.

In years to come, Southan said most people will seek to leave places they live when it gets too hot, noting there are ares in Italy that have demonstrated this behavior for decades.

“The sun is no longer a thing to worship,” Southan said.