diff --git a/.travis.yml b/.travis.yml
index f6f1bbc6ec418628067a70944b11ef280826ece5..b9ea312d7c42e7d075bea6ceb82302126b6b0581 100644
--- a/.travis.yml
+++ b/.travis.yml
@@ -75,7 +75,7 @@ script:
   - mkdir build
   - cd build
   - export CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH=/tmp/_ci/install
-  - cmake ..
+  - cmake .. -DPYTHON_EXECUTABLE=$PYTHON_DEFAULT_VERSION
   - make
   - ./extra_lib
   - cd /tmp/_ci/build
diff --git a/travis_custom/custom_before_install b/travis_custom/custom_before_install
index 9fbf67f3a6737793c537863274f5c8b3df5a6af5..678c5f66d423b1432102b3320a4ab80fc2f22887 100755
--- a/travis_custom/custom_before_install
+++ b/travis_custom/custom_before_install
@@ -2,8 +2,10 @@
 
 # Add Python dependency
 echo "TRAVIS_PYTHON_VERSION=$TRAVIS_PYTHON_VERSION"
+export PYTHON_DEFAULT_VERSION=$(which python2)
 if [[ $TRAVIS_PYTHON_VERSION -gt 30 ]]; then
   export APT_DEPENDENCIES=$APT_DEPENDENCIES" python3-numpy"
+  export PYTHON_DEFAULT_VERSION=$(which python3)
 fi
 
 # When this script is called the current directory is ./custom_travis