Fall is the new summer: Autumn travel comes into its own

Cinque Terre, Italy, in thermal layers. Ireland in ceaseless rain. For decades, I restricted most of my European travels to fall because, whatever the weather, I enjoyed the feeling of having the hotel, trail, restaurant or cathedral to myself.

But I won’t be alone this year.

From resort towns in Europe to popular summer destinations in the United States, places once emptied by October are now brimming with guests. Booking.com reported notable growth in searches for traditional beach trips such as the Hamptons — up 78% year-over-year in September and 45% in October — and Cape Cod. Searches for rooms in Dublin are up 35% in the fall over summer, according to Expedia, and Virtuoso, a consortium of high-end travel agencies, says that fall bookings have climbed 30% this year.

At Fairmont hotels in the United States, Canada and the Caribbean, occupancy in the shoulder seasons — fall and spring — has nearly doubled since 2019. Omer Acar, the CEO of Raffles and Fairmont hotels and resorts, credited remote work, the boom in music and event travel, and “guests seeking to travel based on their passions as opposed to seasonality.”

Fall’s surge owes some credit to the broader boom in travel. Last year, 1.4 billion people traveled internationally, up from 673 million in 2000, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council.

With more of them seeking better access and fewer crowds, “the offseason is now its own season,” said Jared Sternberg, the president and founder of Gondwana Ecotours, which offers nature-focused tours.

Growth, of course, diminishes the deals that were once the reward for bundling up for walks on the beach in Cannes rather than stripping down for a swim. Fall prices for European flights have been rising since 2022. In Portland, Maine, the Canopy by Hilton Portland Waterfront hotel offers October rates within $50 of those for July and August. At Envoyage, a network of travel agencies, advisers have sold Rhine River cruises from October through December at prices on par with or even higher than May through September.

In some destinations, climate change has encouraged fall travel by extending milder weather. In the French Riviera, September — when highs average in the low 80s — is now as busy as August. This year, the luxury cruise line Silversea announced year-round sailings in the Mediterranean. And in the Italian Alps, with diminished early snows, the Grand Hotel Courmayeur Mont Blanc will remain open this fall for the first time, rather than closing in mid-September and reopening in December for the ski season.

Dry conditions are “effectively extending the autumn season,” said Chiara Borghi, the marketing manager at R Collection Hotels, which runs the resort.

Travelers escaping overheated homelands have driven fall bookings at Nimmo Bay in the Great Bear Rainforest in British Columbia. Originally a summer-only fishing lodge, the resort has transitioned over the past decade to a six-month season, with wildlife watching, paddling, and culinary and wellness offerings alongside fly-fishing for coho salmon, with no fall discounts.

“Nimmo Bay recognizes that the fall has its own special magic and appeal, and we have not felt the need to discount the rate for guests from around the world to agree with that,” said Fraser Murray, the owner of Nimmo Bay.

The fallout from overtourism — including shoulder-to-shoulder summer crowds in places like Venice and Dubrovnik, Croatia, and anti-tourism protests in Spain — has pushed some travelers to delay departures to later in the year.

Color tours and harvest events have long inspired fall travelers. Foliage fans can catch the changing spectrum of the Sequatchie Valley outside Chattanooga, Tenn., at Bolt Farm Treehouse — a collection of tree houses, mirrored cabins and geodesic domes — at rates nearly 15% above the summer average. In the Alentejo region of Portugal, fall’s traffic rivals summer’s, driven by grape harvests, olive oil pressings and mushroom foraging.

Growing awareness of lesser-known natural phenomena, such as elk rutting in the American West and coral spawning in the Caribbean, has contributed to fall’s spike. Alaska’s fat bear competition in Katmai National Park has grown so popular that one outfitter is offering a series of late September trips to photograph the telegenic grizzlies bulking up on fall salmon runs, even though the park’s lodge closes Sept. 18 and seeing the bears requires a daily floatplane trip.

Still, people travel for myriad reasons that have nothing to do with the weather, so why not pursue them (if you can) when the hassles are fewer? In Kennebunkport, Maine, guests of the Nonantum Resort can now sequester themselves in a floating sauna on the Kennebunk River, which has boosted fall bookings before the resort’s seasonal closure in December.

In the Colorado Rockies, Aspen has lost about 30 days of skiing since 1980 to climate change. But with the exception of a few weeks pre- and post-ski season, Aspen is perpetually busy thanks to events, heat-fleeing visitors and savvy marketing.

This year, travel’s growing fall frenzy has pushed my Europe visit beyond October to the grayer month of November.