The amount of people who have asked me if Tim and I worked out and watched what we ate while on our honeymoon is thoroughly amusing. Are we seriously that fascinating?

I’m finding that the people who question us on this tend to fall into one of two categories.

There are those who ask with a tone of judgment. It’s almost like it’s expected I’m going to respond with an answer like, “Um yeah, why wouldn’t we?” or “Yes, of COURSE we worked out every day!” Which, for the record, would be perfectly fine if that’s what we wanted to do and weren’t letting it control the fun of our vacation.

Then there are those who ask with a hint of fear. Or maybe it’s curiosity. Skepticism? Insecurity? I can’t pinpoint it. But I find the folks in this group look either relieved or shocked (or both!) when I break it to them that no, we didn’t really “watch what we ate.” And that we “only” worked out a couple of times in total over the course of two weeks from our wedding day until being back at work.

Let me just set the record straight.

The absolute last thing on my mind during my honeymoon was how to stay healthy on my honeymoon.

After the stress of wedding planning in the last couple of months leading up to our wedding, Tim and I really needed our vacation time to just refresh mentally. We needed to relax, enjoy ourselves, and come down from the craziness! And I think it’s pretty safe to say that counting calories or setting a strict workout plan while on vacation would NOT have helped us relax.

Our strategy was to each pack only a couple of workout outfits so that we’d be ready to workout if we felt like it. Whatever happened was going to happen, but we weren’t going to force anything just for the sake of getting a workout in. Over the course of our ten day trip, we ended up using the gym at each of the two hotels we stayed at. We checked out each gym once, for a quick twenty minutes each. In and out.

I also took a beachside yoga class one morning. It was an amazing spot to practice and an incredibly relaxing way to start the day.

Aside from that, Tim and I walked daily on the beach and did some excursions and activities that kept us moving and active. Things that didn’t require us to be inside the walls of a gym while on the most beautiful Caribbean island.

The majority of our trip though? THIS.

And this.

And this.

As for nutrition, our only approach was to just enjoy the Aruban food that everyone told us was so amazing. We ate what we wanted to eat, and it was as simple as that. Some nights that meant bread with dinner. Others it meant dessert. Adult beverages were consumed every single day. Without any guilt.

On the flip side, even though we had an all you can eat buffet at each of our hotels, I didn’t gorge on breakfast. One nutrition mindset that has really helped me over the years is to remind myself that just because something is there doesn’t mean I HAVE to eat it. Most mornings I stuck with omelettes and fruit, and Tim and I split a ginormous waffle on the one day I was really craving one. Throughout the trip, I didn’t order many fried foods (exceptions: fish tacos and calamari) because most fried foods aren’t very appealing to me. And I still focused mostly every meal around protein and vegetables. That’s just how I roll. None of these things felt like I was really trying very hard, because it’s just how I live all of the time. 

So what am I really trying to say with all this? Even though our workouts didn’t involve heavy lifting or crazy intense spin classes, and even though we we indulged far more than we do while we’re at home, I still think we stayed healthy on our honeymoon. We didn’t stuff ourselves silly every single day, we stayed active enough, and oh yeah, we were able to SLEEP. Oh my gosh, I can’t believe what a difference getting 8+ hours of sleep a night made in how we felt. There was also a key element missing from the entire trip: stress. We weren’t stressing out about a freaking thing. Stress really can wreak havoc on your body and mind in some very weird ways, as it did with mine in August, and it was just so wonderful to not feel any stress at all. We didn’t check any work emails, we stayed off social media as much as possible, and we didn’t have any timelines or deadlines to worry about. To me, that is how to stay healthy while you travel.

And I will take a stress free vacation where I can have new experiences and enjoy new things over any kind of strict diet or exercise guidelines any day.

Readers, let’s chat! How do you stay healthy on vacation? Do you follow any guidelines for movement or nutrition?