Winter has arrived! Depending on where you live, you might be facing snow, ice, and freezing temperatures, making you want to snuggle under a cozy blanket. On the flip side, winter also offers a bunch of activities that you can’t enjoy during other times of the year. Either way, winter is here.
If you love staying active but aren’t a fan of the cold, it can be tough to keep up with your routine during this season. To stay active without loving the snow, you might need to embrace winter sports, take up outdoor hobbies, try modified summer sports, or look for ways to stay active indoors.
The best way to figure out what to do in the winter is to think about what you enjoy during the summer. If you love hiking, canoeing, or swimming, you might want to try winter sports to keep yourself moving. Activities like snowshoeing, skiing, or ice skating are winter versions of the fun stuff you do in warmer months. These not only keep you entertained but also help you stay active and break the winter monotony.
So instead of cranking up the heat and hiding indoors all winter, try out a sport that keeps you interested in the outdoors and active. Some winter activities are more strenuous than others, but you don’t always need a full-body workout. Many winter hobbies offer low-impact exercise to get you outside. Making snow angels, building snowmen, and sledding are fun ways to spend time outdoors and be somewhat active. You can even try metal detecting in the snow, which is a great low-impact exercise for any age.
Ice fishing, bird watching, and photography are also hobbies that keep you outdoors and moving, even if the exercise isn’t intense. If you’re someone who usually spends an hour a day hiking or walking the dog in summer, you might not find these as fulfilling, but they’re still good options to get outside and stay active.
Just because it’s cold out doesn’t mean you have to give up your favorite summer activities. Many of them can be modified for winter. Camping, jogging, bike riding, and rock climbing can all be adjusted for the colder months. Even surfing is possible with the right winter wetsuit.
Staying active and exercising outside doesn’t have to stop just because of the cold. You can adapt activities like snowshoeing to a winter campsite, jogging with warmer clothes, using wider bike tires, or finding a different rock climbing spot. These tweaks allow you to enjoy your favorite summer activities even in winter.
For some, braving the freezing outdoors just isn’t an option. If you can’t stand the cold or just don’t want to be outside, you can still stay active indoors. Joining a gym, investing in home workout equipment, doing Wii workouts, or focusing on simple at-home exercises are all great ways to keep moving. While fun outdoor activities are great, they’re not always practical for daily workouts.
This is why some prefer indoor exercises like crunches, pushups, and lunges around the living room, or even at-home yoga, to stay active while staying warm. The key is to keep moving during these difficult months to stay active.
For those who prefer activities over a gym routine, it’s easy to become less motivated. But with options like winter sports, outdoor hobbies, modified summer activities, and indoor workouts, you can stay active during winter, even if it’s just to avoid binging on Netflix under a blanket all season.