6 Easy Tips for Saving Your Skin on Long Haul Flights

Travel. It’s one of my most favorite things to do, but….

It’s also one of the hardest things on my skin. If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you might remember that part of my new year’s resolutions were to start taking better care of my skin. For once, I actually followed through on it, and I’ve actually become a little bit obsessed.

Beauty was never something I was really interested in and frankly, makeup is still not that exciting to me — I wear basically the same makeup to everything, whether it’s a work day or a wedding — oops.

The thing that pushed me from being sort of interested in skincare to being completely hooked was simply the results I was seeing. — clearer, smoother skin with less dark spots and breakouts. Even the fine lines that had starting making themselves at home on my face have softened. Plus, at the end of the day, it’s so relaxing to just unwind and go through my whole skincare regimen.

If you haven’t started one yet, you should — you (and your skin) deserve it.

It’s easy to take care of my skin when I’m at home. I have my arsenal of go to skincare that includes face masks, serums, eye creams, moisturizers, cleansers, etc. (okay, now I sound a bit like a beauty hoarder, there’s not that much), but when I’m traveling, it isn’t quite as easy. Thankfully, goop’s new skincare line arrived in my mail just a week before I left, so I figured that my trip was as good as ever to test it out — they were travel size, so why not?!

Is it just me or do long flight seem to suck the life out of your skin?!

Whenever I get off the plane after a long flight, I feel like my skin looks so tired and dry. So, on my last international trip, I planned appropriately so that when I got off the plane my skin looked fresh, hydrated and as awake as possible after 8 hours! Even if you don’t feel it, traveling can be such a shock to your body — long flights, climate changes and jet lag.

1. Skip the Makeup

Let’s be real, by the time you land in a new country your makeup from 10 hours earlier isn’t going to look good anymore, so my advice? Skip it all together. I typically like to do this resurfacing mask or this clay mask the night or morning before I leave for a long trip so that my skin already feels fresh!

2. Bring a Refillable Water Bottle

Drinking lots of water before and during your flight is key to keeping your body and skin hydrated! I always bring a refillable bottle so I can have plenty of water. Most airports now have those water bottle filling stations that make it super easy! Just make sure you don’t have your water bottle full before security! There won’t be a refilling station on the plane, so I always ask for two waters when they serve drinks. I’ll drink one and pour the other into my water bottle for later.

3. Go Easy on the Wine

It tempting for me to want to indulge in a few adult beverages when I’m traveling — it is vacation after all! But the more alcohol you consume, the less hydrated you’ll be and for me, the worse I sleep. So, I’ll have one glass of wine with dinner and then switch back to water for the rest of the flight.

4. Cleanse & Hydrate

After dinner, I start winding down and in preparation for a nap, I like to clean up and this is where the in-flight regimen really begins. I’ll head to the bathroom, wipe my face clean with one of these wipes and spray on this rose toner, which smells amazing. While that dries, I brush my teeth and take my contacts out.

Next I applied this enriching face oil from goop’s new line! Leave it to GP to make an amazing skincare line, right?! I admit I was really nervous about putting oil on my face. If you have oily skin, you might understand my hesitation. For as long as I can remember, I purposely avoided products with oil in them because they would cause breakouts. But guess what? That didn’t happen at all. Instead it left my skin feeling incredibly soft and moisturized! After that set in a bit, I applied this luxurious night cream, also from the goop line. It’s amazing and I actually plan on buying the full size when I’m done with this sample.

5. Sleep

Easiser said than done, right? I’m pretty terrible at sleeping in a sitting position which is typically my only option when flying. For my last flight, I brought ZzzQuil and took one after dinner which actually allowed me to sleep for about 2-3 hours which is a lot more than I usually do! Sleeping of course is good for your skin and even though it wasn’t much sleep, it helped with jet lag once we arrived.

6. Prep For the New Day

About an hour or so before we land, breakfast was served and that was my cue to get my skin prepped for a new day. Again, I wiped my face clean — I swear airplanes make my skin filthy! I started with the toner again and then used this Revitalizing Day Moisturzer and Clinique’s Pep Start eye cream to make my eyes look more awake.

Do you have any skin-saving tips for long flights? Does your beauty routine change when you’re traveling?

BTW, 6 steps to better skin everyday, and it’s just hair.