Working Out On Vacation 28/84

I'm spending this weekend in a cabin up in northern Wisconsin with my lovely wife and some of her coworkers. It's super relaxing and always great to get away from working and the every day stresses of life. Luckily for you guys, I have enough cell service to still write a post for today (don't worry, it's raining right now anyway). Given my situation, I wanted to write a bit about what I'm doing to make sure I stay on track with food and exercise while I'm up here.

First things first, I made time to make sure I got a good lift in before I left on Friday. I don't usually like to workout earlier in the day but I made an exception because I knew I wouldn't be doing much in the way of resistance training while I was here. My last workout for the week was the leg day from the Anti-Dadbod workout and it was rough! Great workout, but rough. If you can make time to hit the gym before you go, you need to. Set yourself up right and get a good start to the weekend with a good lift.

Although there isn't much to lift up here, there's a ton of cardio and outdoor activities to do. Yesterday we went paddle boarding for about 45 minutes around the island we were on. If you've never been on a paddle board there's tons of balance, core, back, and legs involved in staying upright and making yourself move.  Today we went on a hike through the woods at a trial nearby. This quickly turned into a trail RUN because we're all geniuses and forgot to bring bug spray. Ever been eaten alive be mosquitos? It's not fun. Neither is running in Timberland boost with a pack on. But it got my heart rate up! So that was cool.

There are 1,000 other things you can do on vacation to make sure you get a little exercise in each day. It doesn't have to be much, but you want to try and do something. To be honest, simply the amount of movement you do during the day is going to have the biggest health
benefits for you. This applies to daily life as well. Moving more is better.

Here's a list of ideas to keep in mind for the next time your away.

-Hiking
-Swimming
-Running (intervals are great)
-Kayaking/ canoeing
-Any sports like volleyball, soccer, corn hole, badminton, or any summer activity

If you want something a little more structured you can always find 20 minutes to do a bodyweight workout. You can make your friends do it with you to make it more fun. All you have to do is pick 5-10 exercises and do them in a circuit style for 10-20 minutes to get a good heart rate spike. Here are some exercise ideas

-Squats
-Lunges/ side lunges
-Single Leg RDLS
-Split squats
-Glute bridges
-Squat Jumps

-Push-ups and variations
-Burpees
-Handstand holds/ push-ups

-Planks and variations
-Sit-ups
-Leg Lifts
-Russian Twists
-Back Extensions
-Bird Dogs
-Deadbugs
-Crawling/animal patterns

Obviously there's a ton more but that should be plenty to get you through a weekend. Pick a few, pick a number or reps for each, repeat for a while. You don't need anything fancy you just need to move. I would probably recommend a couple upper body, a couple lower body, a couple core, and a couple cardio exercises to get a good mix of everything.

Now I'm not saying you should focus on fitness the whole time you're in vacation, but your goals need to be in the back of your mind. This goes back to my earlier post on finding your Why and how bad you really want to hit your goals. Get your fitness done early each day and then spend the day relaxing and having fun.