Join us for the Fall 2016 Low Carb Challenge!
It’s so easy to eat low carb practically anywhere. There are so many food choices, and it doesn’t have to be complicated at all.
That’s one of the things I really love about it! That and how great I feel, and how much weight I’ve lost. 🙂
My kayaking trip yesterday is a good example of that. I’ll show you what we packed, how we packed it, and how easy it is to eat low carb on the go.
This will give you some SIMPLE ideas for your own outdoor adventures – or when you just need quick & easy low carb foods or snacks. 😉
Kayaking is an amazing (and FUN!) upper body workout, by the way. Not just for your arms but for your entire core, as well as the back and shoulder muscles. I get the most out of it by engaging my core, then breathing out when I row.
Like most of our outdoor adventures, we’re very minimalist and keep it light. That makes for less prep, less mess, and less to carry! We did bring food to fuel up on this kayaking trip though, because we were going at least twice the distance as our first kayaking trip… and any kind of outdoor exercise can work up a serious appetite.:)
Photo Tour Of My Day & Low Carb Meals
I started the day with my usual healthy low carb breakfast: 1/2 cup pecans, 1/4 cup Daisy brand cottage cheese, 4 small diced strawberries and 17.5 grams of blueberries. That came to 6 net carbs and 85% healthy fat.
I wrapped up some work in my home office, then packed up my things for our kayaking trip. I decided to make a “Low Carb Granola Nut Mix” to take. I needed something easy and compact, not a lot of bulk, but also FILLING foods.
I used 20 ounces of Blue Diamond salted almonds (all I had left), 60 ounces of raw pecans, then I added 1.5 servings of the Cranberry Nut & Flax Granola that I talked about here.
I weighed out each of the portions on my Ozeri Digital Kitchen Scale and put it all together in a Ziploc bag.
Here’s what it looked like (the picture below). I really LOVE the granola, by itself or with nuts. It’s great with white cheeses too, like brie or mozzarella.
It kinda looks weird, but it tastes GREAT! 🙂
Speaking of Ziploc bags, I put all of my other things in baggies too – inside my cotton tote (which machine washes very well). That poor bag has been drug through the water, through the woods, through caves, under waterfalls… lol.
I also had my Calicase Waterproof Phone Case and my Contigo Travel Mug. My coffee goes with me everywhere! Plus plenty of bottled water of course. 🙂
My bag got soaked but my phone stayed dry and safe, my coffee never spilled (!), and all of my stuff stayed dry (chapstick, lunch, my ID and other misc items).
We paddled hard and fast the first leg of the trip, all the way to the railroad bridge at the dam. We got out there and climbed up the rock pillar to have lunch in the shade. We worked up a great appetite kayaking!
Joe brought a bag of walnuts and pecans, turkey slices and salted cucumbers. I think I had a couple slices of cucumber, but otherwise ate my mozzarella sticks and nuts & granola. It was a great EASY healthy (low carb) lunch!
I really loved the nuts & granola together.
That was delicious with the mozzarella. 🙂
The low carb granola is only 2 net carbs per serving, it’s sugar free and has no sugar alcohols, and it comes in 3 flavors. I had the Cranberry in my nut mix. You can see the nutrition facts or order it online here.
Next we got out and carried our kayaks around the bridge and back down to the river below the dam. You can see the railroad bridge behind me in this picture, where we had just stopped for lunch:
We walked our kayaks downstream a bit, and I kept falling. 😛 I totally had on the wrong shoes, lol. I was wearing my flip flops that float (which seemed smart). I regretted not bringing my Northside Water Sandals for sure. My feet are sore today!
I didn’t finish all the food I packed on the trip, so I just finished that when I got home. I was entirely too wiped out to make (or even go get) dinner! I ate the rest of my nut mix and my last mozzarella stick, and I was in bed (sound asleep) by 8pm, lol. 🙂
Here’s My MyFitnessPal Diary for Tuesday:
Macronutrients: Simple Explanation Of Low Carb Macros
How To Get A Net Carbs Column in MyFitnessPal
Calories: 1656
Net Carbs: 21
Total Carbs: 60
Protein: 60 Grams
80% Fat, 14% Protein
Exercise: Kayaking
Fitbit Steps: 4,288
Water: 75 ounces
It was an absolutely amazing day, and GREAT exercise! We had perfect weather for the trip with plenty of sunshine, intermittent cloud cover, and even a few sprinkles. 🙂
Here’s a cool picture of Joe, where I caught his reflection in the water. 🙂
He’s a real trooper, going along with my crazy idea to double our trip by hiking around the dam with kayaks, and doing a second leg downriver. It was tons of fun though, and we both got to see a piece of the river we’d never been on before.
We’re both wiped out today of course. 🙂
We are both looking a lot more lean lately. Not just from our weekly fitness adventures and our individual workout routines, but because we’ve both been eating healthier (me: consistently super low carb). That feels GOOD.
Building even more muscle this summer has been amazing too!
Side Note: Yesterday I had on less clothes than I would normally feel comfortable wearing in public. I had a tee & shorts for coverup, but while kayaking I wore a bikini top and workout shorts – because I wanted to get some sun.
I did feel self conscious, but not near as bad as I would have a few short months ago. That felt NICE. Still, every time I looked down at whatever was hanging out… I got a fresh dose of motivation to paddle harder 😛 LOL!
Exercising with friends is fun!
I used to have local girlfriends I went to the gym with. We started out meeting for lunch or dinner and catching up, then decided we could chat on the treadmill just as easily, and actually get in shape doing it.:)
When I stayed the week with my friend Tawnya in White Rock Beach last year, we got matching Fitbits and walked everywhere we went. We got so competitive that we would walk circles around each other, lol. We still compete with each other using the Fitbit app, but it’s so much more fun to DO THINGS together in person.
Be the one to take the lead and suggest FUN activities that get you moving when it comes to spending quality time with your friends or family.
You’ll make memories that last a lifetime. 🙂
How are things going for you?
It’s day 17 of the 90 Day Challenge. How are you doing with your low carb meals & macro tracking? Any questions or struggles? I would love to hear your results so far.
Leave a comment and let’s talk!
Best,
Lynn Terry,
aka @LowCarbTraveler
p.s. It’s a common misconception that you “need carbs for energy” or that you should increase your carb intake for strenuous workouts. That’s not true. Well, it’s not true if you eat low carb. On a ketogenic low carb diet, you fuel your body with healthy fats.
Nuts like walnuts & pecans are a great choice when hiking or doing outdoor workouts, because they’re easy to tote and they’re a “real food” high-fat snack.





Discount Code: LOWCARBTRAVELER

Hi Lynn,
I so grateful to have found your blog and be able to follow your posts. Super inspiring.
I have a question about how you pack some of your foods on your adventures….do you ever worry about items that typically would be kept cold? ie. cheese. I also only like cold water and once it gets warmish or room temperature it’s tough for me to drink.
Hi Kimme π
We take a small backpack with a coldpack & insulated bag for cheese & cucumbers. It’s very small though, we don’t pack tons because we want to travel light. You never know what we might get into! lol
I actually like my cheese warm and melty. π As for the water… I drank A LOT yesterday. When you’re working that hard in that kind of heat & humidity, you’ll drink it any way you can get it. haha
I have had what,seems like an unquenchable thirst lately and i have been drinking lots and lots of water since Sunday i have not been doing a lot of outdoors activities but it has been so very hot and humid outside this week and i have been doing lots of errands that required me to drive around in the heat or walking outdoors
my daughter thinks maybe i got dehydrated and was why i was so thirsty
I got worried cause i know a symptom of diabetis is excessive thirst but even if i was diabetic i would be on the best diet in the world for that. π
Sometimes the more water you drink, the thirstier you’ll get. In that case, drink chicken broth to replace the sodium & electrolytes. It may just be keto flu, from where you ate off plan the other day. And going back into ketosis is a diuretic process. Chicken broth will help with that too. Even just a cup or 1 1/2 cups.
I say that – the more water you drink, the thirstier you feel – because if you drink too much water (to the point your urine is clear) it flushes out the sodium and electrolytes and actually makes you dehydrated – as crazy as that sounds. π
Chicken broth or pickle juice is recommended as a quick cure, or during keto flu.
That makes sense Lyn. I think that is what happened to me. I drank so much water that i felt bloatedand yes my urine was colorless
i will try the chicken broth tomorrow. I have three water bottles by my bedside right now. I am still so thirsty.
Thanks Lyn.
I DO feel dehydrated. I do not have pickles but i have the juice from a bottle of olives
Chicken broth sounds good and i may throw some raw spinach in it too. π
You’ll feel so much better after you have the broth. π I like Campbell’s condensed canned broth, like you cook with (don’t get low sodium, for this you NEED the sodium).
I mix mine with 3/4 can of water instead of 1:1 and drink it hot out of a mug.
Campbell’s tastes a lot better than the boxed broth (Swanson?).
It looked like you had so much fun Lynn, and you don’t need to feel uncomfortable in less clothing :), you looked great.
Again I agree with you about the cheese, “they” actually say cheese is best at room temperature, so I like it warm and melty too, same with water when I’m thursty, right from the tap is the most quenching to me, I don’t like it cold.
I gained 1.6 lbs this morning? I don’t know why, I really have been good and actually not eating very much because I don’t have much of an appetite. The only thing I can think that I’m doing different is eating the SF candy and not a lot mind but I am eating some. Maybe it’s stalling me? I don’t know. That plus I didn’t walk the last few days, but I don’t walk every day anyway? Even though I have been trying to, it was pouring rain yesterday and my knee hurt the day before, I did walk today :).
Thank you Roye π but I’m a conservative 43 year old woman, and it WAS male company π lol. Plus there were children out and about, along the river trail…
You see me gain and rise/drop all the time. It’s totally normal. It could just be water weight, hormone cycles (even men have those), or who knows what. Stress causes it too, as well as not enough sleep – or even poor sleep quality.
Just keep the “eat for your health” saying on the tip of your tongue on days like that, knowing that you’re eating to be healthy, and the long term results are so much better than “eating unhealthy.” π
I think back to all my mysterious gains and long stalls over the last 4-6 months… but look how much leaner I am now than I was then! Even 10-15 pounds lost makes such a BIG difference.
“but Iβm a conservative 43 year old woman”. I totally understand, I’m conservative too.
And I was down a lb this morning :). I’m not going to get concerned about gaining, I know it’s normal, I’m just gonna keep on keepin on ;).
π π I may live in Tennessee, but I *do* try to keep it classy – lol.
Glad to hear you’re down a pound!!
Hi Lynn,
This is my first week on LCHF way of eating. I am finding it alot easier now that I found your site. I love it. You inspire me! I love the easy meals you make and I tried your favorite breakfast today. It was great. I cut the pecans to 1/4 of a cup which was just fine for me.I think I will have it for breakfast or lunch for the rest of the week. I have lost 4lbs since I last weighed myself on Sunday night. I have a goal of losing 50lbs. I have managed to lose 50 lbs on other plans but have plateaued and decided to try LCHF to help me get back on track.I have my 23 yo daughter and my husband doing this also and so far so good! I was able to download the add-on to MFP to get the net carbs and I like it so much better. Bummed that I had paid for the premium but will discontinue that now that I know about the hack thanks to you!
Wow, Yolanda – that’s great!! And I’m so glad to hear your family is on board too. π That makes it fun! I eat the “low carb cereal” usually once a day myself. It has GREAT macros, which really helps you get enough healthy fat into your day.