Yoga travel

I’m currently loading a metric asston of my favorite music onto my phone with its shiny new microSD card, so I figured I’d answer a question from Melissa about traveling with a yoga mat.

There are a lot of ways you can go with this, all of which will depend on what kind of yoga and how much of it you’re going to do while traveling.

For example, when we went to India we had a limited amount of luggage and I wasn’t sure how much room I’d have to spread out – not to mention the space a yoga mat would fill could hold a lot of souvenirs. I went with some yoga paws, which are gloves and almost-footies that have contact points made of the same material as an inexpensive ($10-15) yoga mat. They take up almost no space and are good for yoga on the move, but not for a lot of seated or kneeling poses.

There are also travel mats, designed to be folded, which I haven’t personally used.

What I’ve done for almost all my travel is carry my mat on with me. I’ve got a nice little bag which is mat-shaped with an extra pocked on the inside and outside. It provides great protection for the mat (rain or shine) and has just enough space for keys/i.d./towel/small stuff that would be useful in a studio. I use that as one of my personal items and then usually carry a regular carry-on bag rather than checking luggage. Et voila – two bags, no baggage claim.

The reason I carry on my mat is because I’ve got a Jade Harmony mat worth every bit of the $50ish I paid for it. It’s a natural rubber and no matter how much I sweat (I’m looking at you Forrest Hip Hop Yoga class in Boston and Urban Yoga Spa in Seattle) I do. not. slip. Since I sweat like a center for the Detroit Lions, it’s a huge bonus to have my own mat with me unless the circumstances require otherwise (see: 14 hour flight, foreign country).