Depending on the amount and type of driving you do in your RV, you may find yourself stiff or sore at the end of the day. A long trip, especially if you have tense conditions such as high traffic, bad weather, or treacherous roads, can make the problems even worse. Your shoulders, arms, and hands can get tired from holding the wheel for extended periods. Your back, hip, legs, or knees can get tired from sitting in a relatively confined position all day, especially with your foot on the gas pedal. 

One good way to avoid, or at least lessen, this discomfort is to take frequent breaks to stretch. Every time you stop to get gas, rest, or see the sights, try to stretch. Just like with yoga, you want to stretch against the tension. If your back has been curved forward, now you need to stretch it the opposite direction, arching your back and shoulders. Next, roll your shoulders in small circles, forward and back. Neck rolls also help release the tension; just let your head droop down toward your chest, then make slow, relaxed circles all the way around.

You should also stretch out before starting your drive. Do your neck and shoulder stretches during your morning shower. Stretch your back while tying your shoes, and stretch your hamstrings before getting in your RV. Place your leg on the bottom step, then slowly lean forward to feel a slight burn against your hamstring.

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Nobody likes to exercise while on vacation. My wife and I with our 2 kids spend a lot of weekends during the summer relaxing at the campground. We both work hard all week and it's nice to have the weekends to relax and do enjoyable things. Our friends camp in the spot next to us so there is always something to do or somewhere to go. Exercise is the last thing on our minds.



The best way I have found to get exercise is not to think of it as 'exercise'. It's more fun to take a walk to look at the scenery or take the bikes to the trail down the road for a ride. This is fun stuff, not exercise. The RV lifestyle begs for folks to enjoy the outdoors. Get out and enjoy it! Any activity is really exercise in disguise.

Most RVs today have all the comforts of home: microwaves, stereos, and TVs. Ours even has 3 TVs!  However, something about RVing makes us want to be outside and be more active. Our daughters are just like any other kids.  All it seems they want to do while at home is sit and watch TV, play video games, or talk on the phone. When we're in the camper, their favorite activities change. They are not satisfied unless we are outside playing a game or sitting around the campfire after dark. This makes it easy to get them active and keep them healthy.

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Driving and eating tend to go hand in hand. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's out of boredom or simply because you haven't sat down for a real meal in a while. Regardless, all those salty, sugary, fat laden roadster snacks can add up to extra inches on the waist and padding where you sit. Here are some tips to help you be a healthy traveler.



Convenience is everything! Pack a small cutting board and a few quality knives. Keep some plastic grocery bags on hand to easily dispose of the waste. Zip top bags can keep your veggie strips, and fresh fruit handy. Small plastic containers hold grapes, low fat cheese cubes, and cherry tomatoes. Having these on hand while driving can help keep the munchies away without adding extra calories.



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Staying active is crucial to continued good health and longevity. Getting the recommended 30-60 minutes of exercise daily can be a challenge while on the road. One way to help achieve this is to start practicing yoga. Simple stretches can be done in your R.V., while more complicated ones will need more space. A good mat and small cushions can be easily stowed away at an arms reach in your camper.

The benefits of yoga are innumerable!  First of all is the obvious increase in flexibility, enhancing your balance and coordination, as well.  But yoga benefits go far beyond our outward physique.   Studies have show that blood chemistry is improved, too, as cholesterol, insulin levels, and enzymes are stabilized at normal levels.  As you go through the poses, or Asanas, the deep breathing helps to improve the oxygen levels in your blood, fully oxygenating the entire body.  This results in more energy and stamina, and raising your metabolism.  This also helps in any weight loss efforts.   Poses can be modified for those with physical limitations, so that most all people can enjoy the benefits of yoga.  

Yoga also has a meditative quality, helping to lower your heart rate and enhance relaxation.  Many people discover an increase in memory and focus, as well as reducing anxiety and stress.  When you are feeling and looking your best, it is sure to be a self-esteem boost, as well.

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With the winter ski season well into gear, I'm finding out again how much exercise there really is involved in skiing.  Gliding down the slopes is the goal, but there's a lot more to it than that.  Living across from The Canyons Resort in Utah three weeks a month gives us the opportunity to ski about 5 mornings a week, religiously I might add.  We hop up at the ungodly hour of 6 a.m., do a 25-minute stretch, have a good breakfast of steel cut oatmeal, and proceed to get dressed in our ski gear.  This is where the real exercise begins.  With 4 layers on the top and two layers on the bottom before I even put on my suit, it's quite the ordeal.  Then we drive 5 minutes across the street in our Sportsmobile, pop the top and proceed to finish getting dressed.  Putting on ski boots takes some real effort, making sure everything is tight enough.  On goes the head cover, then my helmet, and then I pull on my glove liners and then my gloves.  Now I'm ready.  We throw our skis on our shoulder and walk to the cabriolet for a ride up to the base, then get out to walk another 100 yards or so to the gondola for a ride up to mid-mountain.  OK, now we're ready to really ski, but first I have to trudge through the snow for another 25 yards in my ski boots before I knock the snow off and put on my skis.  Ahhhh.  We hop on the lift and begin our first ascent.  The first run is always so invigorating after all that preparation.  Then after 2-3 hours of skiing with views of the most incredible scenery, the freshest of air, and possibly the sighting of a stray moose or elk, I'm ready to head home to work for the afternoon.  I throw my skis back on my shoulder, walk back to the cabriolet, ride down to the parking lot, walk to the Sportsmobile, and pull off my ski boots.  So you can see that even with only 10-12 runs under my belt for the day, there's much more to skiing than meets the eye.  I wouldn't trade any other exercise for it.  I'm shooting for another 50 days this season.  See you on the slopes!
- Toni Knudson

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During many, many holiday seasons in the past, I used to gain 5-10 lbs. religiously, no matter how much I tried to avoid it.  Come January 1, I struggled with various diets to lose it as quickly as I had gained it.  Key word: struggled.  No fun there.  But I did it - every year.  Then every year I'd vow not to overeat all the high caloric, delicious dishes and foods, but, alas, to no avail.  Everything just looked so danged good.  My will-power was definitely on vacation and nowhere to be seen.

Let's face it.  No matter where we go during the Holidays, there's going to be lots and lots of food choices (good and bad) to be had and decisions to be made about what and how much to eat so we don't gain that unwanted weight every year.  That's a given.  Yes, I love to eat, try new foods, and enjoy my favorites - like everybody else.   Yum!

So here's what I do that works for me.  Say we're at a Christmas gathering of some sort at someone's house or at a good restaurant with a beautiful array of fabulous dishes and delicious desserts - way too many desserts.  Is it me or do desserts come out of the woodwork during the Holiday season?  Anyway, what I do is eat everything I really want.  Here's the kicker:  I eat a lot more of the healthy items and a very teensy, tiny amount of the not-so-healthy items I want, for instance, pumpkin cheesecake, various fried foods, and party tray meats.  So that's how I avoid gaining weight over the holidays.  Simple?  Yes.  Easy?  Not really.  It takes will power, but the rewards are endless.  Better health being the best one.  Try it for yourself this Christmas season.  It feels great come January 1.
May God bless all of you in your journeys.  Be safe on the roads!

- Toni Knudson

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I've been reading recently that a diet high in complex carbohydrates, i.e., fruits, vegetables, grains, legumes, nuts and seeds, are excellent to maintain a healthy existence.  In other words, they're anti-aging.  They're high in fiber and have definite beneficial effects on constipation, high blood pressure, ulcers, hemorrhoids, colorectal cancer and other common "aging" afflictions.  They're rich in phytochemicals that prevent everything from cancer and heart disease to those awful age spots we seem to get as we get older.  Eating a high complex carbohydrate diet not only makes you feel better, but you look better, too.  Easily digested, complex carbohydrates counter the problem of a slowing metabolism, something that also happens as we age.  So why don't we eat more of them?  Changing our diet is no more difficult than changing our minds, but it has to be a commitment to change our lifestyles - not just for a few weeks, but for the rest of our lives.
Diesel and I have been searching for new things to incorporate into our daily regimen over the last seven years to increase our vitality, stamina, and our immune systems.  Yes, we love all the bad stuff there is to eat, so it's a constant vigilance over what we choose to put in our mouths.  But, for the most part, our choices are good.  Lots of spices and herbs - more on that later.  The fresher, the better.  Organic anything is always best.  Always.
Did you know that eating too many acidic foods are really bad for you because they contribute to a lot of diseases we don't want.  So keeping our pH level in the range of 6.8 is ideal for fighting off potential problems.  They say it's a good idea to test our urine every morning with a pH strip.  Sounds like a lot of work to me, but once a week sounds better, out of curiosity's sake anyway.  They just might have something there.  We're all about better health.

Have a great Thanksgiving with your friends and family, and stay safe on the roads or wherever you might be!

- Toni Knudson

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OK, four days later, I was feeling much better - no more muscle spasms or pinched nerves.  I did my 25-minute stretch for the last 3 mornings and it feels really good - no stress to my muscles.  Flexibility is what we're looking for.  It's always difficult to start a new exercise program, but starting it is the key.  I already feel a difference in my flexibility.   Ahhhhhhhhhh.

- Toni Knudson

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We have two more months before ski season and started doing our 25-minute stretch in the morning earlier this week.  It helps with flexibility and core strength and gets us ready for the more rigorous activities of skiing.  But yesterday morning I put in a brand new DVD entitled "Rapid Results Pilates" to mix up our exercise routine.  Now, mind you, I've never done Pilates but have heard how good it is to develop core strength and to tone and sculpt problem areas.  Long story short, as inexperienced as I was to Pilates, I still tried to do all the movements of the very experienced instructor.  Not good.
A couple of hours later, I realized I had pinched a nerve in my back.  Ignoring it, I went Trikking a little bit later and then played Ladder Golf which requires bending over.  By the end of the day I was even more in distress.  I slept on a heating pad with a towel over it which helped me sleep through the night, but turning over was very painful.  I woke up this morning to find I could hardly walk or sit without excruciating pain.
Now I've had pinched nerves before, usually from a sports-related activity, and they always resolve themselves after a couple of days with rest and over-the-counter pain relievers such as ibuprofen.  But as we get older, it's easier and easier to unknowingly strain ourselves, resulting in pinched nerves and other associated problems.  Problems that can be exacerbated by activity that can take longer to heal, which could lead to more aggressive treatment.  My goal is not to need aggressive medical treatment for anything, so I'm going to just take it easy for a few days and hopefully heal up just fine and dandy.
Sometimes these things happen as a reminder to take things slow at first, and then work up to more difficult levels when taking on  new exercise programs.  Our bodies are pretty smart, if we learn to listen to them.
Come back every Monday to see my new blog entries on everything having to do with good health.  Have a safe and wonderful week!

- Toni Knudson

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Yes, I've got high cholesterol in spite of being generally healthy otherwise.  It's a thorn in my side as I get older and I have to pay close attention to lowering it, along with millions of others with the same problem.  Cholesterol is not the monster we think it is.  Our bodies produce it every day.  It's so important that if we don't get enough from our food intake, our liver manufactures it.  It's not the cholesterol in our cells we have to worry about, but when levels of cholesterol get high in our blood, that's when it can clog arteries and strain our hearts.  Over time the cholesterol in our arteries forms plaque.  Lowering cholesterol may also slow down, reduce, or even stop plaque from building up.
I don't like nor do I take medications.  Not even to lower my cholesterol.  I personally can't envision taking a pill for the rest of my life that has serious side effects.  So I'm researching natural healing and have found a few things that are extremely helpful and easy to do to lower my cholesterol.  Oatmeal, for one.  A friend just turned us on to steel cut oats.  Steel cut oats are oats seed that have been chopped into pieces.  The benefits exceed any rolled or instant oatmeals on the market today.  It's full of fiber, helps to reduce LDL (the bad kind), helps to increase HDL (the good kind), has lots of protein, and tastes great!  Fiber is key because roughage speeds up the body's ability to eliminate cholesterol. 
We buy steel cut oats in bulk - it's very inexpensive.  I'll take several cups and soak it overnight in water for easier cooking during the week, storing what I don't use in a bowl or a jar with a lid in the refrigerator.   While it's cooking, I'll add a handful of craisins (yum!) and about a dozen almonds that I cut into pieces, which makes for a complete nutritional delicious breakfast that stays with me all morning. 
So I've dedicated myself to eating it for breakfast 3-4 times a week for 60 days when I'll have my bloodwork re-done to see much my cholesterol has improved.  I know it's only one piece of the puzzle, so I'll be re-visiting the subject of cholesterol over the upcoming months.  There's much more than can be done naturally to improve it, and that's my mission.  Another side effect is that it also helps to lower health insurance premiums.   Saving money is good, especially these days.  Does anyone have any suggestions of their own to lower cholesterol?

- Toni Knudson

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