8 Ways To Stay Fit While Traveling

How to Stay Fit While Traveling? It’s that familiar whisper in our heads just before a trip.

For someone who’ll find any excuse not to go to the gym, I seem to have the best of intentions for holiday fitness. My running shoes are a regular fixture in my luggage and my skipping rope has a permanent spot in my carry-on zip pocket.

Granted, exercising while traveling sounds like a bit of a bore. I get it, I totally do, a vacation doesn’t really seem like a vacation if you’re still slugging it out on the treadmill, even if said treadmill is located on a peninsular above a white-sandy beach. But those of us who are constantly on the road, or who are leaving for an extended period, need to keep up some sort movement a couple of times a week for general health and wellbeing… especially when all we want to do is eat cheese and sip vino and just generally indulge – it is a holiday after all!

So I’ll let you in on a little secret, the key to holiday fitness is using your surroundings to stay motivated, no stuffy gyms and definitely no treadmills required! Want to know more? Here are 8 ways to stay fit while traveling that won’t bore your (sports) socks off!

1. Invest in a foldable yoga mat specifically designed for travelling. I have one that is 0.1 inches thin and perfect for unraveling on a quiet beach or a secluded patch of grassland.
2. Obviously you can skip the dumbbells, but there’s plenty of light equipment you can pack such as a skipping rope and resistance bands that will keep those croissants you consumed for lunch from going straight to your hips.
3. Reuse those 1L water bottles you bought sightseeing as makeshift weights for your workout.
4. Book a hotel room on a higher floor and always take the stairs!
5. Try to exercise first thing in the morning. Those excuses you make throughout the day at home are magnified by 1000 when on holiday! Too many distractions!
6. If you’re going on a beach vacation, pack your one-piece and some goggles and hit the resort pool for some laps first thing in the morning before the families arrive.
7. One of my favorite things to do when traveling to a foreign city is going for a run in the streets moments after I settle into my hotel room. Not only does this stretch out my travel-weary muscles and release endorphins that fight jet lag, but it allows me to get my bearings in an unfamiliar city that I may need to navigate later on in my trip.
8. Why not book an experiential holiday and kill two birds with one…trip? Try skiing in Europe, or surfing/yoga retreats in Bali, or learn to Scuba Dive in the Maldives. You’ll have loads of fun and your body will thank you for it!