No Pain No gain is what they say – but can they work miracles?

So you have boarded the ship and the first place to go if your cabin isn’t ready, is the buffet restaurant.  Once you have tasted the delights of lunch you find yourself with a couple of hours to spare before life boat drill – so off you go round the ship with your map learning your way round your new surroundings for the following cruise. All is going well, and then you get to the fitness and well being area of the ship. You place one foot within the spa and all of a sudden you are greeted by lots of spa staff all wanting to tell you about the offers and treatments they have available. After dodging them and escaping without adding anything to your on board account, and empty promises you will read the literature they gave you and will be in touch with what you wish to book,  you then hit the dreaded area called …………………………..the gym.

Gym facilities of the Queen Mary 2 (see previous blog here)

As you enter the gym you can feel the instructors eyes on you giving you the once or twice over and thinking how they would love for you to sign up to their programmes so they can put you through your paces and basically torture you for the entire cruise.  You  quickly whiz round and look at the facilities on offer not knowing how to use majority of them let alone which part of the body they are supposed to work/tone the body, and make a hasty retreat out of the gym.  No matter which ship I have been on – when I am on my walk through the gym there is already people working out – did they look at the buffet restaurant and put on 2lbs already? or are they paid by the cruise line to be in there and disembarked just before sailing whilst we are all at life boat drill?

So as you can gather reading this i am not a fan of the gym at home or on holiday and don’t take my gym wear with me on holiday mainly for two reasons: firstly I didn’t really own any until the other day and secondly I just don’t have the time as there is so much else to do whilst on a cruise  that working out whilst on holiday is not my idea of fun. When i am going through the deck plans telling my customers about facilities of the ship they are enquiring/booking and I mention the gym – the general response is “well I won’t be using that” or  “don’t find exercising on holiday as a relaxing thing  to do”

Many ships as well as having a fully equipped gym do offer fitness classes such as Pilates, spinning, yoga and even Zumba. (Me and my sister did go to a couple of the zumba classes whilst we were on Celebrity Constellation but they only used the Wii game – where as on Royal Caribbean they have actually trained zumba instructors on board) Some ships also have rock climbing walls,  sports courts, flowrider, paddle tennis courts and boxing rings to help you exercise and keep fit.

Starting from today (4th January 2014) I am changing my mindset and lifestyle and commencing my New Years resolution – to lose weight and do some exercise. I am feeling confident I can do this, this year – I have signed up to a well known fat fighting point counting club to combat the healthy eating side, and  just before Christmas I was lucky enough to win a 3 months, all singing all dancing membership at my local Leisure Centre, which gives me full unlimited access to all the facilities and classes for free. At the time of writing this blog I have 2 hours until my gym induction – so wish me luck.

I have read recently for something to become a habit it takes 66 days – so fingers crossed on the 11th March 2014 going to the gym is habit.  Although i have no cruises planned at the moment (just one night on the new NCL Getaway – but that will be a later blog this month) I will from now on take my gym clothes on holiday and make the time to work out as if I was at home.

Do you use the gym on board a cruise or is it an area you also avoid? Which ships have you been on that offer the best fitness programmes/gym facilities?