Riverboat cruise and didn't gain any weight!

checkmatekingtwo
checkmatekingtwo Posts: 118 Member
edited November 21 in Health and Weight Loss
Last week I went on a riverboat cruise on the American Queen paddlewheeler up the Mississippi and Ohio rivers. Oh, boy, did they have a great chef onboard! I went with the plan that i would still log as best i could, and the intention to eat at maintenance. If possible, up my exercise to earn some more more calories (the day I got lost hiking the Kentucky hills, I burned a lot of excess calories!). With my Garmin pedometer it was easy to track my walking and make sure I was over my regular routine. Plus, I'm 284 pounds, so my calorie maintenance level is pretty high.

Well, I just want everyone to know that it is doable to have a great vacation, eat three meals a day (with desert) and not gain ... at least when you're at my level.

When I came back from the vacation, I nearly had a heart attack when I got on the scale and it said I'd gained 7 pounds. I just had to assure myself that I knew I did not eat 3500 calories over maintenance every day, so I could not possibly have gained that amount of weight. It had to be water or something else.

Well, in just 5 days of being back to my regular diet, I've dropped the 7 pounds plus one more ... so, no, I'd never really gained 7 pounds of fat, just 7 pounds of happy vacation that disappeared immediately.

But thank goodness I committed to logging ... otherwise I would have gone way overboard on the snack eating. It was fairly easy to make good choices with the menu items, but, boy, there were snacks everywhere, and they were all awesome!

Small victories! Anyone else have vacation success stories?

Replies

  • thereshegoesagain
    thereshegoesagain Posts: 1,056 Member
    Congratulations on a job well done! I wasn't so lucky on my week long cruise along with 2 weeks afterwards in Paris. I pretty much ate and drank whatever I cared to, but as I now eat well anyway, it wasn't as bad as it could have been. But I only gained 4 lbs and have worked it off along with another 5. Getting back on track right away really helped. My dang husband lost 5 lbs. on the trip.
  • Kalikel
    Kalikel Posts: 9,603 Member
    Congratulations!! Did you fly? Flying always adds at least five pounds for me.

    Glad you had a great time and didn't have to pay for it! :)
  • janiep81
    janiep81 Posts: 248 Member
    edited July 2015
    Did you stop in my hometown, Paducah, Kentucky? Its a common stop for those riverboat cruises... fun little place if you like that sort of thing. :)
  • janiep81
    janiep81 Posts: 248 Member
    Oh - and I have a vacation success story! I just spent a long weekend in Chattanooga with my family. They had a lot of junk in the house but I just committed to logging everything and I felt so much more in control! I brought a few of my own snacks and had to "advocate" for meals at mealtimes. (Sometimes they just gogogo and don't want to stop to eat, then they get really hungry and binge later.) I also had to workout... But I lost 2.5 lbs. :)
  • checkmatekingtwo
    checkmatekingtwo Posts: 118 Member
    janiep81 wrote: »
    Did you stop in my hometown, Paducah, Kentucky? Its a common stop for those riverboat cruises... fun little place if you like that sort of thing. :)

    Yes! The cruise ended in Paducah where we watched the fireworks on July 4. It was lovely! Also went to the quilt museum there. Originally the boat wasn't supposed to go to Paducah, but to St. Louis. However, the river was so flooded they couldn't make it under the bridges to St. Louis, so we took this alternate trip. Loved it!
  • Chief_Rocka
    Chief_Rocka Posts: 4,710 Member
    Drop 7 pound in 5 days with the Riverboat Diet
  • BrianaDuBois
    BrianaDuBois Posts: 48 Member
    I'll be on vacation in Maryland in two weeks and then Myrtle Beach two weeks after that. I'm hoping to be as good as you! Although I have to say, I will be allotting for eating s'mores one night in Myrtle Beach with my young (ages 4 and 5) cousins.
    If I were still early on in the process when I had trouble with boredom eating, stress eating, actual hunger, and portion control, I think I would be setting myself up for failure.
  • jaga13
    jaga13 Posts: 1,149 Member
    Well done!
  • Bshmerlie
    Bshmerlie Posts: 1,026 Member
    I've been on four different vacations in the last four months and haven't gained a pound on any of them. I'm going on a cruise at the end of July. I'm just going to eat like a healthy weight person would eat. I'm over 200 pounds and my maintenance level is definitely higher then that. I'll be ok.
  • ManiacalLaugh
    ManiacalLaugh Posts: 1,048 Member
    checkmatekingtwo wrote: »

    Well, in just 5 days of being back to my regular diet, I've dropped the 7 pounds plus one more ... so, no, I'd never really gained 7 pounds of fat, just 7 pounds of happy vacation that disappeared immediately.

    Happy vacation water weight, yes. That's probably my favorite kind of weight to gain.

    Good for you for sticking through it once you got back and recognizing the temporary nature of it! I think there are a lot of people who also have heart attacks when they see a post-vacation weight and then get discouraged, not realizing that if they went back to logging and deficit eating, it'd be mostly gone by the end of the week.

    No success story here, but I'm hoping I'd have one soon. Going on vacation at the end of July. Planning on splurging. :)
  • JeanMBK
    JeanMBK Posts: 728 Member
    Sounds like a great vacation!
  • DawnieB1977
    DawnieB1977 Posts: 4,248 Member
    Well done, and sounds like a great holiday! I only gained a pound on my honeymoon to Cuba, 2 weeks all inclusive. This was way before I'd discovered MFP. I had rum and coke and cocktails every day :)
  • lddfsu
    lddfsu Posts: 38 Member
    I'm going on a river cruise in Europe in 2 weeks, and I plan on doing the same thing. I want to enjoy myself. I know we'll be doing a ton of walking, so I'm not too concerned.
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