Advice provided by the guides at Mountain Trek on a variety of health, nutrition, fitness and hiking topics.

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Sleep Tips for Beating the Winter Blues

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Sleep better and peacefully

Nothing could impact our health, mood, and vitality more than a good night’s sleep. Without it, we simply can’t function our best.  Less sleep directly compromises our immune system, lowers our stamina, and promotes the symptoms of Seasonal Affective Disorder (“SAD”).

Our sleep-wake cycle is regulated by the “drowsiness” hormone melatonin, which is produced by the pineal gland. Melatonin levels are higher in the winter due to decreased sunlight, and without bright morning sunlight, it lingers longer in the morning. This makes it difficult to wake up.

Tips for Regulating Melatonin and the Sleep-Wake Cycle

Keeping your batteries replenished through the darker winter months is achieved by keeping your sleep-wake cycle similar to other times of the year.  Here’s how:

  • Maintain a regular sleep schedule as much as possible, even on the weekends.
  • Try to get as much natural light as possible in the morning hours before 8 am, to help lower melatonin levels.  Sit by the window or go for a morning walk.
  • Use a lightbox for phototherapy to help balance your circadian rhythm and combat SAD. This full-spectrum light can be placed next to your bed and programmed on a timer to get brighter in the mornings, to mimic sunrise. This helps shut off the production of melatonin. However, it’s important to use lightboxes according to the natural pattern of summer sunlight, because too much bright light at the wrong times can result in insomnia. So use them to stimulate dawn (6 am – 8 am) every morning for the duration of the winter.
  • If you take melatonin supplements, do so in consultation with your physician, and take it around 8 pm to avoid staying up too late, and sleeping in too late.
  • Keep active with exercise!  Not only does it release endorphins, serotonin, and dopamine hormones to lift your mood, but tiring your body with healthy exertion will naturally contribute to a restful sleep, and keep your energy levels higher during the day.

Although melatonin is the hormone that regulates hibernation in animals, we don’t have to spend the winter months drowsy and holed up in our houses. You can maintain a healthy sleep-wake cycle through the winter, and get out and enjoy the season!

What is Mountain Trek?

Mountain Trek is the health reset you’ve been looking for. Our award-winning retreat, immersed in the lush nature of British Columbia, will help you unplug, recharge, sleep deeply, and roll back years of stress and unhealthy habits. To learn more about the retreat, and how we can help you reset your health, please email us at info@mountaintrek.com or reach out below:

The Discomfort of too much “Comfort” Food

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Getting a Handle on Emotional Eating

During the holiday season, eating healthy can be hard when you are surrounded by temptation. The holidays can also be stressful and trigger psychological reasons to munch, even though we’re not hungry. Whether it’s due to loneliness, or to distract from an issue brewing in our life, it’s tempting to snack or over-eat to fill a void that isn’t in our stomach.

We equate a lot of emotion and nostalgia with food, from associations formed in childhood and clever advertising that equates eating with happiness. But we’re certainly not happy when we gain weight and become burdened by extra pounds, elevated cholesterol, heart disease, and Type 2 Diabetes.

Recognizing the triggers that compel you to snack is an empowering eye-opener.  Observe yourself to become aware of your eating habits, and with each mouthful, understand exactly why you are eating, and if you’re really hungry or not.

How to break your emotional eating habits

Eating in response to emotions or certain situations can be a habit well ingrained since childhood.

  • Commit to a daily log of everything you eat, and when. Include a column for writing the reason you’re eating at that time. Is it because you’re hungry or something else?
  • Recognize your eating patterns, and become aware of emotional issues that are “eating you” and trigger you to over-eat.
  • Consider therapies such as counseling, life coaching, or hypnotherapy to address unresolved emotional patterns, and meet with a Nutritionist to establish new food choices.
  • Catch your negative food choices (like reaching for the chips) and choose another action.  Distract your mind by replacing the snack with another activity. Fill up with water or a cup of tea, write in your journal, do something physical like a walk, stretch- you get the idea.  Set new habits in motion, which make you feel better about yourself and motivate you to keep at it!
  • Keep only healthy foods in your kitchen, and stop buying junky snack food.  If you find yourself craving something sweet in the evening, try chamomile tea with honey or natural sweetener, or a few dates instead of chocolate to reward yourself.
  • Relieve stress in other ways besides eating.  You know, that e-word (exercise!), meditation, or by doing something creative.
  • Incorporate new routines and activities in your life to reduce boredom, and decrease your “trigger” times. Instead of watching TV, talk to a friend, do housework or a project you’ve put off for too long.

Enjoy the holiday season, knowing your waistline doesn’t have to expand!

What is Mountain Trek?

Mountain Trek is the health reset you’ve been looking for. Our award-winning health retreat, immersed in the lush nature of British Columbia, will help you detox, unplug, recharge, and roll back years of stress and unhealthy habits. To learn more about the retreat, and how we can help you reset your health, please email us at info@mountaintrek.com or reach out below:

Tabata Training: The 4 Minute Miracle

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woman sprinting training on a track

If you’re thinking you’re legs are about to fall off, and sucking wind like crazy, signs are you’re doing a Tabata workout correctly. You may be wondering why anyone would intentionally do that to themselves, but there is a reason that high-intensity interval training (HIIT) is a go-to workout. 

This Japanese exercise import is super effective and super hard! Tabata is the name of the Japanese researcher who discovered a way to increase both anaerobic and aerobic pathways at the same time. It’s an excellent training program. It fits across all training disciplines, for athletes and beginners looking to increase their VO2max and lose fat quickly. To read the whole study, check out this article published by the National Center for Biotechnology.

How to do a HIIT Workout

It’s simple! After warming up, choose a maximum intensity exercise and perform it in the following manner:

  1. For 20 seconds, do as many reps as possible of your maximum intensity exercise. Or run/bike as hard as you can–with 110% output.
  2. Rest for 10 seconds.
  3. Repeat seven more times for a total of 4 minutes.
  4. Cool down and stretch.

Yes, it’s short, but you have to go ALL OUT to get the big benefits.

Getting Started with Tabata/HIIT

Choose the Right Exercise or Movement

Tabata can be done with any exercise, but the best exercise options are those that use a large number of muscles. Examples include bicycle sprints, squats, jumping rope, mountain climbers, push-ups, row machine, or running on a mini-tramp or treadmill. Start with the one you’re comfortable with.

Watch the Clock

Get a timer. Many apps are available for your iPhone, iPod or a gymboss works great.

Be Your Own Cheerleader

Get the right mental attitude; a positive mantra that will get you through it!

Increase your weight or intensity if you are able to complete each round without reaching MMF (momentary muscular failure). 

A ten-second break is a ten-second break! Ten seconds is not watching a video, talking to the cute girl on the bike, talking to a friend, then doing the next set. If you cheat, you’re only cheating yourself out of reaping the rewards of this intense workout.

What is Mountain Trek?

Mountain Trek is the health reset you’ve been looking for. Our award-winning retreat, immersed in the lush nature of British Columbia, will help you unplug, recharge, and roll back years of stress and unhealthy habits. To learn more about the retreat, and how we can help you reset your health, please email us at info@mountaintrek.com or reach out below:

Caring For Your Feet – Tips and Products To Use

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Foot Care at Mountain Trek

At Mountain Trek, guided hikes are a part of our daily schedule. When we are so used to being seated for most of our days, our feet can take a beating when it’s time to hit the trail. Long distances require some care for the feet, especially if the feet are kept prisoner in city shoes for the week. So we want to share a couple of our favorite products with you.

Foot Care Tips for Hiking and Walking

Friar’s Balsam

The first product is Friar’s Balsam or Tincture of Benzoin. It is a brown liquid that you dip a Q-tip into and paint on the heel of your foot as an anchor to put bandages on. You can get this at any pharmacy.

Mefix Tape

The second product is a tape called Mefix. This is a slippery thin tape that takes barely any room in your shoe. We cut this tape to a 2 ½ inch length, round the corners so your sock doesn’t peel it off, and we stick that from the sole of your foot over your heel bone, working up the Achilles, and that picks up the friction that occurs as your foot goes up and down.

Molefoam

Molefoam is a fuzzy foam pad that protects from pressure in our shoes. We cut little donuts out of that and place it over bone spurs, bunions, callus points, any place you’re worried about the pressure that you normally feel in any shoe. You would cut a little rectangle piece out of it, flip it over, cut a half-circle, round the corners, and voila, you have a little donut.

Pedicure

Remember to cut your toenails back, because if they’re too long and they slide at the end of your shoe, they’re going to hammer and you’re going to lose a nail. Make sure that the corners are filed so that your toes fit in your shoe, when they’re continually moving for balance, don’t dig in and scrape each other.

Lamb’s Wool

To that point, I also want to talk about another product, which is Lamb’s Wool. You may have used this with Mountain Trek before. We take this product for some of you that get blisters because your toes are overworking for balance, and we weave this in between the toes so the toes have something that picks up the friction and doesn’t allow moisture from sweat to cause the skin to get soft and rub and peel off. So that’s something you can also pick up at the pharmacy.

All the best to you, and happy trails and enjoy the sun as spring starts to come forward.

What is Mountain Trek?

Mountain Trek is the health reset you’ve been looking for. Our award-winning health retreat, immersed in the lush nature of British Columbia, will help you detox, unplug, recharge, and roll back years of stress and unhealthy habits. To learn more about the retreat, and how we can help you reset your health, please email us at info@mountaintrek.com or reach out below:

Exercise Doesn’t Do Depression

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ThenExercise to avoid depression

It is no secret – regular exercise is not only a vital contributor to fitness and health but is the key to boosting mental health. The evidence clearly shows that exercise is a magic bullet in combating illness in all areas of our being; physical, mental, and emotional.

At Mountain Trek we know how exercise contributes to fitness and weight loss – we’ve built our program around it. We’ve also been witness to the stress release and mood elevation experienced with every guest that comes through the Mountain Trek program.

Prescriptions vs. An Active Life

There is a growing backlash against looking for a cure to depression in a prescription bottle alone. With new research showing that antidepressants can actually cause depression, many are turning to natural and holistic solutions. Dr. Peter Breggin, a Harvard-trained psychiatrist points this out in his article on antidepressants:

It has been apparent for many years that chronic exposure to SSRI antidepressants frequently makes people feel apathetic or less engaged in their lives, and ultimately more depressed.

With antidepressants being the second most prescribed group of drugs in America, there is a pressing need to reclaim our natural birthright of health and vitality another way.

Studies show that exercising, in conjunction with anti-depressants produces better results than medication alone. As a preventive measure, or as a management strategy in conjunction with prescription medication, exercise deserves a closer look as a better solution to combating depression.

So what happens during exercise to shift your mood and outlook on life? Besides obvious benefits to the rest of your body, let’s take a look at what happens in the brain.

The Science Behind Exercise and Happiness

Exercise causes a variety of chemical reactions that help with everything from improving your memory to your mood, and to get better sleep – naturally. Exercise also:

  • Rebuilds and generates new neurons resulting in increased brainpower
  • Enhances mood and resistance due to endorphins
  • Slows aging and improves cognitive ability in seniors

Essentially, depression negates the brain’s ability to adapt by limiting the ability of neurotransmitters (such as dopamine and serotonin) to communicate throughout the brain. Then, your brain gets locked into a loop of self-loathing and also loses the flexibility to work its way out of the hole. Exercise counters all that by boosting the production of BDNF (brain-developed neurotrophic factor); which is a protein that helps neurotransmitters perform their function. This, in turn, helps people emerge from their depressed state of mind.

How to Start Curbing Depression Through Exercise

The best part is it doesn’t take much to produce BDNF protein and start curbing those depressed feelings. One simple solution is to go for a walk in nature. When surrounded by fresh air while moving your body has a two-fold effect of clearing the mind and strengthening it. In Japan they call it Shinrin-yoku or “Forest Bathing” and studies have proven 50 minutes in nature helps to lower cortisol and increase dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin levels. (For more about the effects of being outdoors on your psyche, check out a book called Your Brain on Nature by doctors Eva Selhub and Alan Logan.)

There are other exercises you can do anywhere and you don’t even have to think about going to a gym. In fact, here are five full-body exercises you can do right now.

So try on a few easy exercises, like walking up and down one flight of stairs, and treat your brain to some self-esteem and mood enhancement!

What is Mountain Trek?

Mountain Trek is the health reset you’ve been looking for. Our award-winning health retreat, immersed in the lush nature of British Columbia and featuring daily sunrise yoga and night-time restorative yoga, will help you unplug, recharge, and roll back years of stress, anxiety, and unhealthy habits. To learn more about the retreat, and how we can help you reset your health, please email us at info@mountaintrek.com or reach out below:

Get Moving for Your Health in 2012

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A day in the alpineAre you still looking for a bit of inspiration to get moving and stay active?

Again and again, the message is about how vitally important it is to incorporate exercise into your life. Dr. Mike Evans, a physician and health columnist has made a strong case for walking as the best and easiest preventative medicine.

If you already walk as your means of exercise, why not enhance your training? You can walk smarter and burn more calories with Nordic walking poles. Poles can literally turn a 20 minute walk into a calorie torching, full-body workout.

At Mountain Trek we incorporate Nordic walking poles for just this reason, and more people are now catching on to them for use at home. Not only do they enhance cardio and provide stability and balance on the trails, but they help straighten posture and tone muscles in the upper body.

Here are some benefits of walking with poles. They:

  • lessen the impact when hitting the ground by 26%
  • engage over 90% of your major muscles (not just your legs!)
  • increase your cardio by a minimum of 20% and increase your calorie burn by up to 48%
  • give a full body workout for all ages and fitness abilities
  • pack up and go with you anywhere
  • support the walker in slippery winter conditions, great for seniors and those recovering from injury.

“Pole walking” is more than a passing trend. It originated in the 1930’s for cross country skiers in Finland to keep fit during the off season. It soon became popular with non-athletes once the total-body benefits and the overall fun of the activity were discovered. For decades it has been the activity of choice for millions of Northern Europeans.

Exercise is a lifestyle

It doesn’t just stop there with walking and cardio exercise however. As we are increasingly aware, maintaining wellness and vitality is a lifestyle, and healthy balance in all areas of life is the key. But without the vital ingredient of regular exercise, we simply won’t achieve the strength, stamina and weight loss that we desire.

Why are Mountain Trek Programs so successful for kick-starting weight loss and vitality? With men losing an average of 6-8 pounds a week and women, an average loss of 4-6 pounds, we provide the ideal combination of cardio, strength training, nutrition and detoxing that guarantees the pounds drop off.

What’s the best thing you can do for your health in 2012? Get active and get walking!

Take 10 minutes to watch this important and clever VIDEO by Dr. Mike Evans to get you motivated!

Calorie Counting – why it’s so inaccurate

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Joanne Holden of the USDA’s Nutrient Data Laboratory in Beltsville, Md., reported to the Chicago Tribune that the USDA has the world’s largest database with information on 100 nutrients for over 7500 foods.  The lab’s main purpose is to manage databases, including the USDA Nutrient Database for Standard Reference, the “gold standard” for nutritionists and the food industry.   The USDA database of 100 nutrients is remarkably small compared to the thousands of nutrients, like antioxidants and phytochemicals, that we now know exist.

The sources of calorie counting

The caloric value of a food or a food component may be determined by measuring the heat of combustion of the food in a bomb calorimeter and then multiplying the heat of combustion by correction factors for incomplete digestion and incomplete oxidation of the food in the body. In about 1900, Wilbur Olin Atwater and his associates at the Connecticut (Storrs) Agriculture Experiment Station, used this approach to determine the caloric values of a number of food components (i.e., the protein, fat, and carbohydrate isolated from various foods). They determined factors appropriate for individual foods or groups of foods, and they proposed the general caloric values of 4, 9 and 4 kcal per gram of dietary protein, fat, and carbohydrate respectively for application to the mixed American diet.

The conversion factors determined by Atwater and his associates (from 1900) remain in use today, and caloric values of foods are calculated using these factors. The caloric values reported in food composition tables are commonly estimated by first determining the approximate composition of each food (i.e., the water, protein, fat, carbohydrate, and ash contents) and then by multiplication of the amount of each energy-yielding component by the appropriate conversion factor.

The correction factors for caloric values do not account for variation of individual absorption, for the influences of an individuals intestinal bacteria on absorption (these change depending on history of travel, antibiotics and present diet), for variation in nutrient density of today’s foods compared to foods from those used in the Atwater research of 1900, for the exclusion of the several thousand nutrients that were unknown in 1900 but that were inadvertently included in the absorbable calories formula and really should not have been.

Consider that the formula for determining calories in food was determined in 1900. Nutrition density of foods was higher in 1900, when food was certainly less processed, more organic and more local (the USDA itself reported in 1999 that the nutrient densities of foods in America was half that of the 1950’s).  The number of known nutrients to science in 1900 was fewer than 16 (current science accepts several thousand nutrients and the USDA lab in Maryland is slowly increasing its nutrient database to just over 100).  Recent metabolic studies and observations, largely supported by and stimulated by blood sugar measurements within the world’s diabetic population, show great variation in how humans absorb food energy, or calories.  These combined factors lead to questioning how accurate, or more appropriately, how inaccurate the common calorie counts of food are.

Moreover, both meal timing and meal composition are steadily gaining in acceptance and validity in helping determine how efficiently (or inefficiently) calories are used by the body.  Ultimately, the validity and usefulness of calorie counts is questionable and certainly individual when compared to other lifestyle factors.

Kirk’s Detox Tips: Spring Clean Your Body

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Detoxing is the body’s way of spring cleaning. With winter well behind us, the sun warming our bodies and fresh food growing, the planet and our bodies are in line for renewal. The following are tips for supporting toxin release and making the most of a cleanse or just a great way to invigorate your body.

Spring & Summer Packing List for Mountain Trek

Deep Breathing

This helps release built up CO2 and waste products. A simple and effective way to practice deep breathing is through cardio focused exercise like hiking or biking and doing yoga.

Liver Cleanse

Liver Cleansing

Cleansing is all about detoxifying our bodies with special focus on the liver and fat soluble toxic chemicals. By upping our intake of bitter green leafy veggies like mustard greens, collard greens and kale. Cleansing is also supported by taking Vitamin E supplements and minimizing or eliminating alcohol.

Kidney Support

Kidney Support

Fluids are tremendously important for detox. Offering the kidney support for cleansing water soluble chemicals can easily be done by consuming 10×8 oz. glasses of filtered water per day (minimum) as well as organic unsweetened cranberry juice which helps emulsify fats and is a powerful antioxidant.

Lymphatic Drainage

Lymphatic Drainage

We can do things to help boost our immunity and shuttle fluids and fats through the lymphatic system. Remove bio waste products and support weight loss through massage, yoga, and dry brushing the skin.

Detox

Sweat

Sweating is a natural way to release toxins through the skin and can be accomplished by intense exercise, infra red sauna and relaxing soaks in mineral rich hot springs like Ainsworth Hot Springs located down the road from our main lodge!

Healthy Bowel Movements

Healthy Bowel Movements

Releasing waste is essential. Support this process by drinking lots of water, digesting fiber rich foods, and maintaining intestinal flora with probiotics.

By employing these simple practices on a regular basis you’ll quickly discover a shift in your overall health and feel your energy and vitality return.

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Hiking Tips & Techniques For Fitness

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Working togetherHere are a few hiking techniques to practice in your new light hiking boots or trail runners…if you wish to prepare before joining us!

How to walk in the Woods at our hiking spa

It is said that ‘the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step’, but what if that step is a steep muddy trail or crossing a moss covered log fording a melt water creek? Hiking in the woods is not always as simple as it sounds. Sure, if you want to lace up the sneakers and hike around Central Park it may be that simple, but to truly define and refine hiking you need to start with your footwork. Proper walking techniques while on the trail can increase endurance, reduce fatigue, and lessen the chance of injury which over all will make that thousand miles quite a bit easier. When we walk on the sidewalks of our hometowns we generally travel over even concrete, reasonably graded hills, uniform staircases and level walkways; all clear of dirt, sand and mud. On the trail none of these ideals exist, so we need to change the way we approach trails and use our minds as well as our feet.

Hiking Tips

Steep uphill:

The biggest mistake people make when climbing the hills is to get up on their toes. Keep your heels down, this will stretch out your calf muscles and Achilles tendons, reducing cramping and strains and it will keep all or most of your boots soles on the ground where they belong and more sole = more traction. Slow your pace by shortening your steps, don’t try to race up the hill, you’ll just tire quicker. Think of it as dropping your car into low gear, more power to climb, for the steepest hills you almost want to walk heel to toe.

Steep downhill:

As with uphill, shorten your stride, slow the pace. Bend your knees slightly to lower your center of gravity downward but not back. Too much leaning back will see your feet sliding out because your weight will be behind you, not over your boots where it should be. Done correctly you’ll find the quadriceps or upper leg muscles taking the brunt of the load, big muscles = a stable balanced descent. Sometimes it seems turning your feet at an angle to the trail will help but this will only increase your chances of rolling over on your ankle. Keep your toes pointed down for the best grip and stability. Most hiking boots are designed to have dirt and mud build up behind ridges on the soles and thus work best pointing straight ahead.

Off-angle or Traverses:

Often a trail paralleling a slope or ridgeline will angle down on one side. Usually leaning the upper body a little more over the uphill foot can help but for some awkward sections it may be easier to turn the feet sideways so the toes point down the off angle and then sidestep the trail for a short distance. This extreme is rare and only for serious odd angles, washouts or more often foot bridges and boardwalks that may have settled on one side.

Rocky (uneven) Trail/ Crossings:

When rocks and tree roots stick up out of the trail it is once again time to slow down. A little more care and focus will see you through. Keep eyes focused a few feet ahead of you and look through or past obstacles, looking at them will usually promote walking into them. The same can be said for log and bridge crossings, focus on the log a few feet ahead and walk with an even pace, don’t look down into the water as it can cause disorientation. Lastly, cross one at a time, two or more people on a log can cause it to bounce or sway.