If you are wondering where you want to take your August vacation this year and you haven’t been to Europe yet you really should consider going. Europe is wide open and much safer than the media would have you believe. As a matter of fact, most European countries are going out of their way to attract American tourist dollars. Tourist bureaus have incentive packages available and hotels and travel agencies are offering some of the lowest rates ever for lodging and airfare.

On January 1, 2002, the European Union adopted a common currency to eliminate the need for residents and travelers to convert their money every time they cross a border. Today it is used by sixteen of the twenty-seven members of the Union and accepted at five others. The countries that have adopted it are Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Spain.

A common currency is not the only factor that makes touring in Europe easier these days. The existence of the European Union itself has made the continent a more pleasant destination for Americans and others from around the world. The global recession has forced previously contending nations to cooperate and do business together. Nationalist resistance has declined as the financial crisis has deepened. The spirit of cooperation has been beneficial to the European tourist industry.

European tours today can be booked originating in any major city and traveling throughout not only Western Europe but through countries that were once locked behind the Iron Curtain on the eastern side of the continent. The presence of the Soviet restrictions for so many years has left many of these nations untouched by time or the commercial intrusions of the West. You can actually travel hundreds of miles without seeing a MacDonald’s or a Coca Cola billboard.

European tours are affordable, safe, and an opportunity to see where momentous events in history have occurred. Rome, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, Amsterdam, Geneva and other destinations you have only dreamed of before are available as destinations in European tours by bus and train. If you have not been there, take some time and tour Europe. You couldn’t possibly find a better time to do it than right now.