Americans Are All Over Europe This Summer. Here’s How to Outsmart the Crowds.

Who’s headed to Europe this summer? You and everybody else.

This year is shaping up to be a record one for American tourism to the Continent. The first five months of this year saw nearly 7% more trips by U.S. citizens to Europe compared with 2023, according to air traffic data from the International Trade Administration.

The crowds have continued as summer has officially kicked off. The top destinations from the U.S. to Europe this season are London, Rome, Paris, Athens and Amsterdam, according to ticket-sale data from Airlines Reporting Corp.

The European leg of Taylor Swift’s Eras tour and the Summer Olympics in Paris have given U.S. travellers extra reasons to visit. And airlines have added dozens of nonstop flights as travellers prioritise vacations abroad.

Travel executives and advisers gave the following tips to save money and headaches this summer:

Forget spontaneity

To combat the influx of visitors, major attractions like the Louvre museum have set daily visitor limits. Venice charges a five-euro fee for day-trippers on certain days through July 14, and the Acropolis in Athens now requires travellers to purchase tickets with predetermined entry times.

Travellers who don’t plan ahead can miss out on these sites, says Nora Blum, vice president at Travel Leaders in Maple Grove, Minn. “People love thinking they want to be free and to go with the flow,” but that’s inadvisable, she says.

While you’re purchasing ahead of time, Blum suggests looking into skip-the-line passes for popular attractions. They cost more but save time.

Don’t give up if the biggest draws are sold out. Instead, check for promotions from the city. In Spain, passes to the Alhambra fortress in Granada sell out quickly. But the city sells a tourist pass that guarantees entry to some of the most popular monuments, as well as trips on public transit.

Barcelona, Rome and the Greek island of Santorini are among the destinations with popular cruise ports. They list scheduled cruise arrivals and the number of passengers on board. Checking the schedule, even if you’re not on a cruise, can help you plan your day to avoid long waits and big crowds, says Margi Arnold, owner of Creative Travel Adventures in Denver.

She suggests getting up early to visit the most popular attractions or traveling to areas that are harder to reach during day trips.

Dinner reservations often make sense in crowded tourist cities, especially for families or larger groups. Some veteran travelers recommend downloading WhatsApp. Many restaurants will correspond over the free messaging app regarding reservations.

Prep for disruptions

It’s common for rail and airport workers to strike . These actions are announced in advance, so travel advisers suggest checking schedules ahead of time to see how you might be affected.

Regardless of strikes, delays can occur because of air-traffic control, weather or other scheduling issues. Before you depart, download relevant apps for flights and trains and sign up for alerts so schedule changes don’t catch you off-guard.

International airports are no place for cutting it close, since options for expedited security screening are limited. Travellers can reserve a time to go through security at six international airports through Clear Reserve , a free service. London Heathrow and Frankfurt Airport in Germany are some of the airports that take reservations.

And read up on rules for liquids. Heathrow requires travellers to remove liquids and put them in clear, resealable bags provided at the checkpoint.

When you return to the U.S., try using mobile passport control , a free app that lets you speed up entry into the country. Travel advisers also recommend taking photos of your passport in case it gets lost.

Keep the heat in mind

Europe is facing another scorching summer. Check whether your lodging has air conditioning—it isn’t a standard offering in many regions, says Arnold, the travel adviser.

Travellers should also bring water bottles and plan breaks indoors during the hottest parts of the day, she says.

Check your health insurance policy

Medicare and Medicaid don’t cover international medical bills. Some private insurances won’t cover all expenses, either.

Before you depart, check your policy and consider buying travel health insurance to avoid pricey charges in a medical emergency.

Bring the right credit card

Travel with a credit card that doesn’t charge foreign transaction fees. Many cards can add charges of 3% or 4% per transaction.

Not every vendor accepts American Express , though it is becoming more available in Europe.

Consider the Olympics

It isn’t too late to attend the Paris Olympics, though it’s not necessarily a cheap ticket. About 30% of hotel rooms in Paris are still available, according to Hotels.com, with the average rate of $455 a night during the Olympics. In Paris, available nightly rates for short-term rentals are averaging $481 a night during that stretch, according to AirDNA, a market-research firm.

Each Thursday, new Olympics event tickets go on sale at 10 a.m. local time—yes, that’s 4 a.m. Eastern—as part of a promotion called Ticketing Thursday. There are also official resale tickets available .

Must even steak be politicised? The American Heart Association recently recommended eating more “plant-based” protein in a move to counter the Health and Human Services Department’s new guidelines calling for more red meat.

Few would argue that eating a Big Mac a day is good for you.

On the other hand, growing evidence, including a study last month in the Journal of the American Medical Association, suggests that eating more meat—particularly unprocessed red meat—can reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s in the quarter or so of people with a particular genetic predisposition.

The APOE4 gene variant is one of the biggest risk factors for Alzheimer’s.

You inherit one copy of the APOE gene from each parent. The most common variant is APOE3; the least is APOE2.

The latter carries a lower risk of Alzheimer’s, while the former is neutral. A quarter of people carry one copy of the APOE4 variant, and about 2% carry two.

APOE4 is more common among people with Northern European and African ancestry. In Europe the variant increases with latitude, and is present in as many as 27% of people in northern countries versus 4% in southern ones. God smiled on the Italians and Greeks.

For unknown reasons, the APOE4 variant increases the risk of Alzheimer’s far more for women than men.

Women’s risk multiplies roughly fourfold if they have one copy and tenfold if they have two. Men with a single copy show little if any higher risk, while those with two face four times the risk.

What makes APOE4 so pernicious? Scientists don’t know exactly, but the variant is also associated with higher cholesterol levels—even among thin people who eat healthily.

Scientists have found that cholesterol builds up in brain cells of APOE4 carriers, which can disrupt communications between neurons and generate amyloid plaque, an Alzheimer’s hallmark.

The Heart Association’s recommendation to eat less red meat may be sound advice for people with high cholesterol caused by indulgent diets.

But a diet high in red meat may be better for the brains of APOE4 carriers.

In the JAMA study, researchers at Sweden’s Karolinska Institute examined how diet, particularly meat consumption, affects dementia risk among seniors with the different APOE variants.

Higher consumption of meat, especially unprocessed red meat, was associated with significantly lower dementia risk for APOE4 carriers.

APOE4 carriers who consumed the most meat—the equivalent of 4.5 ounces a day—were no more likely to develop dementia than noncarriers. (

The study controlled for other variables that are known to affect Alzheimer’s risk including sex, age, physical activity, smoking, alcohol consumption and education.)

APOE4 carriers who ate the most unprocessed meat were at significantly lower risk of dying over the study’s 15-year period and had lower cholesterol than carriers who ate less. Go figure. Noncarriers, however, didn’tenjoy similar benefits from eating more red meat.

The study’s findings are consistent with two large U.K. studies.

One found that each additional 50 grams of red meat (equivalent to half a hamburger patty) that an APOE4 carrier consumed each day was associated with a 36% reduced risk of dementia.

The other found that older women who carried the APOE4 variant and consumed at least one serving a day of unprocessed red meat had a cognitive advantage over carriers who ate less than half a serving, and that this advantage was of roughly equal magnitude to the cognitive disadvantage observed among APOE4 carriers in general.

In all three studies, eating more red meat appeared to negate the increased genetic risk of APOE4.

Perhaps one reason men with the variant are at lower Alzheimer’s risk than women is that men eat more red meat.

These findings might cause chagrin to women who rag their husbands about ordering the rib-eye instead of the heart-healthy salmon.

But remember, the cognitive benefits of eating more red meat appear isolated to APOE4 carriers.

Nutrition is complicated, and categorical recommendations—other than perhaps to avoid nutritionally devoid foods—would best be avoided by governments and health bodies.

Readers can order an at-home test from any number of companies to screen for the APOE4 variant.

The Swedish researchers hypothesize that APOE4 carriers may be evolutionarily adapted to carnivorous diets, since the variant is believed to have emerged between one million and six million years ago during a “hypercarnivorous” period in human history.

The other two APOE variants originated more recently, during eras when humans ate more plants.

APOE4 carriers may absorb more nutrients from meat than plants, the researchers surmise. Vitamin B12—low levels have been associated with cognitive decline—isn’t naturally present in plant-based foods but is abundant in red meat.

Foods high in phytates (such as grains and beans) can interfere with absorption of zinc and iron (also high in red meat), which naturally declines with age. So maybe don’t chuck your steak yet.