How Heat Waves are Changing Tourism in Europe –

In addition to practical steps like wearing sunscreen and drinking plenty of water, Mr. Steves advised travelers to book their museum tickets in advance to avoid standing in line in the heat. When planning future trips, he echoed Ms. Vargas in recommending that people consider traveling during the “shoulder season,” which his tour company now defines as April and October — no longer May and September.

“This is an adjustment period as we regear to live through worsening impacts of climate change,” said Mr. Steves, who pointed out the irony of travelers complaining about the higher temperatures even as they hopped on their carbon-heavy flights to Europe. He suggested that tour companies should invest in climate advocacy, climate-smart agriculture and similar initiatives to mitigate the emissions of their travel to Europe. Carbon offsets are another option, but experts generally agree that those programs alone cannot cover the full carbon cost of our flights.

Even if we stopped all greenhouse gas emissions today, a certain amount of additional warming is already baked into the system, said Dr. Rebecca Carter, who leads climate adaptation work at the World Resources Institute, a think tank based in Washington, D.C. But we haven’t stopped spewing climate-warming gases: Carbon dioxide emissions are on the rise, and the planet is warming faster than ever.

This summer’s intense heat “is not a fluke,” Dr. Carter said, but rather “the beginning of a trend that we’re going to see more of.”

The evidence on the ground in Europe is clear: In Britain, the 10 hottest years in the record books (which go back to 1884) have all occurred in this century. In Germany, the average annual number of “hot days” (those with temperatures reaching 30 degrees Celsius — 86 degrees Fahrenheit — or higher) has trended significantly higher since the 1950s. And in France, scientists have calculated that average temperatures in the northeastern city of Strasbourg are now roughly equivalent to those seen in Lyon, which lies about 240 miles to the south-southwest, in the 1970s.

Dr. Carter added that climate change will continue to come in the form of heat waves and other extreme weather events, many of which will disrupt travel logistics. (She pointed out that planes aren’t certified to fly above certain temperatures, a limit that has already grounded flights in the past.) But when it comes to individual travel decisions, a lot of it will come down to personal tolerance.