Let’s be fair. When we go away on vacation, it’s not to double up on exercise or two try out the range of local healthy foods. If anything, it’s to throw our daily routine to the side and just chill out for two weeks. But there are many ways to actually lose fat on holiday whilst enjoying our time away.

There’s lots of food on vacation. Lots of it. But look at any destination in Europe, Asia or South America, and you will see lean, healthy people eating decent food, and more importantly, enjoying every bite. Mainland Europe, particularly in the south, follows a primarily Mediterranean diet, full of olive oils, nuts, berries, pulses and oily fish. There are so many ways to eat decent ethnic food whatever part of the world we are in, without having to worry about the fat content. Just be sure to proactively hunt out foods that you know to contain either very little saturated or trans fat, or high amounts of fat burning nutrients. You really will not have to search hard.

And what else to people like to do on holiday? Hang out by the pool. But hanging out in the pool is even better. Building a few lengths or more into mornings, lunchtime and evenings (particularly after meal times) is going to burn off fat from the previous meals, as well as exercise pretty much every part of the body in a way that only swimming can. Even running along a beach is going to burn calories and convert fat to energy; as a side note, running on sand or in shallow water is an excellent resistance based work out that is going to see more fat loss than a simple jog through a park.

Just to be clear. Nobody is suggesting we turn our holiday into an exercise extravaganza (although that in itself is a type of vacation!) This is just a few commonsense ways that we can build the things we love about time off and vacation into our lives, losing fat whilst engaging in traditional and enjoyable holiday activities.