Stockholm is sunless for 17 hours a day in December, and London gets 15 days of rain. Greek villages hibernate for the winter, Loire valley inns close their shutters, and, but for the evergreens and skiers, the Black Forest is bare. Surely these are reasons enough for the traveler to stay away.
Not anymore. For many Americans, each summer holiday reaffirms that traveling during peak season is increasingly a flawed experience. Too often it means paying more and seeing less, fighting crowds and missing any sense of a country's way of life. Having sweltered through Athens in August and endured Britain's...