From your gut to your weight: 9 surprising ways travel affects your body
- Pete Wise
Published: July 18, 2026 at 8:00 AM
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When we say that we come home from holiday feeling like a different person, we might be speaking more truth than we realise…
We are all products of our environment – and if we change that environment, the product changes, too.
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Travel has wide-ranging effects on the human body, some good, some bad and many surprising. This can be down to our choice of transport, unfamiliar conditions and quirks of geography. From our brain and gut to feet and skin, change is the only constant.
Going beyond the well-known phenomena such as motion sickness and jet lag, we’ve delved deeper into the physiology of travel to identify the lesser-known effects you might not have heard about, and asked health specialists for guidance on how to ensure your travels leave your body in a good place.
For more travel and wellness guides, check out our guide to unique wellness retreats to book, the best lidos in the UK or nourishing dinner recipes to help with a good night's sleep.
9 surprising ways travel can affect your body
Certain transport methods might help with focus
It has long been understood by scientists that flying tends to increase our levels of adrenaline and norepinephrine, both during the journey and for as long as two days after we land. Ironically, this is believed to stem from a fight-or-flight response, caused by the flight itself.
The experience of an adrenaline or norepinephrine spike can sometimes be unpleasant, and for some it's worse than for others. However, one potential upside to a rush of these hormones (or neurotransmitters, depending on how you define them) is that they may help us focus and learn.
Adrenal stress hormones are linked with enhanced memory formation around emotionally arousing experiences, so you might capitalise on your flighty feelings by doing some work or study that you’re really passionate about. However, an excess of adrenaline can lead to feelings of anxiety and impaired concentration – so, whether travel affects your focus positively or negatively could come down to how intensely your nervous system responds to it.
Active holidays might make your brain bigger
Research has uncovered that active transport – particularly cycling – is linked to a reduced risk of dementia, including both early-onset and late-onset cases. Two of the measures neurologists recommend for slowing down brain ageing are doing mentally stimulating activities and getting plenty of exercise, so it’s perhaps unsurprising that pedalling and navigating your way by bike is a predictor of good neurological health.
Study participants who engaged in active travel also tended to have a larger hippocampus than those who did not. This part of the brain is important for navigation and memorisation – both well-used capabilities among adventurous travellers.
Your weight changes
...and not because of a few too many indulgent holiday meals. One of the factors that determines our weight is gravity. The Earth bulges at the equator, so when you travel towards it, you move slightly further from the planet’s centre of gravity, meaning you’ll weigh slightly less (even though your mass does not change with the latitude).
Gravity is not the only force at play – centrifugal force, which is greater at the equator, has a yet larger effect on our weight in this context. The combined influence of reduced gravity and increased centrifugal force means that a trip to equatorial climes can reduce our weight by anywhere from about 0.3-1 per cent, depending on whose maths you believe.
If you’re seized by the peculiar urge to weigh even less, travel to the Moon, where your body weight would be reduced by about five-sixths.
Long journeys can affect your feet
A potential physiological downside to travel is how it can affect our feet. Sitting for a long time on trains, planes or in a car can cause edema (swelling), with uncomfortable short-term consequences.
“Swelling of the feet is a common problem on trains and planes,” says Freya Holmes, an HCPC-registered podiatrist at Cockermouth Podiatry.
“On a plane, cabin pressure and gravity cause fluid to collect in feet and ankles, while sitting for a long time on any mode of transport reduces blood circulation.
“The main symptoms with edema are puffy feet, puffy ankles, tight-feeling footwear and discomfort. It usually resolves within a few hours of starting to walk again,” she adds.
Regardless of your health and age, Holmes recommends taking steps to minimise swelling when embarking on long journeys.
“Everyone could benefit from wearing support stockings during travel – I wore them on a long-haul flight to Australia earlier this year,” she says. “You can also limit swelling, stiffness or soreness by standing up and walking every 1-2 hours, occasionally flexing and pointing your feet while seated, and avoiding tight socks and shoes. If your feet are swollen after arrival, elevate them.”
Your microbiome changes
At least in the short term, travel can greatly affect the microbes living in our digestive system.
“When we travel, our gut microbiome can change surprisingly quickly,” says Dr Megan Rossi, founder of The Gut Health Doctor and the microbial supplement brand Smart Strains. “That’s because we’re not just exposed to different foods, but also different microbes in the environment, altered meal timings, disrupted sleep, stress, changes in physical activity and, in some cases, gut infections.
“Studies following international travellers have shown shifts in the composition of the gut microbiome after visiting different regions. Some people also temporarily acquire bacteria that are uncommon in their home country, including antibiotic-resistant strains, even if they don’t develop symptoms. Fortunately, for most healthy people, these changes appear to be temporary,” she adds.
Taking steps to keep your gut microbiome healthy before you depart could help to minimise ill effects during travel. “Research suggests that people with a richer, more diverse gut microbiome are less likely to develop travellers’ diarrhoea,” Dr Rossi notes. Check out our best recipes for a healthy gut for cooking inspiration before you travel.
Menstruation can be affected
If you've ever experienced changes in your periods when travelling, you're not alone. As with many matters of women’s health, research into this topic is scarce, but in one survey by the travel company Much Better Adventures, 22 per cent of respondents said they’d had late periods while travelling, while 22 per cent had early periods and 13 per cent experienced worse symptoms than usual – showing that travel can impact patterns for some holidaymakers.
Various explanations for these effects have been suggested, including body clock changes, physical stress and psychological stress leading to the release of cortisol, which interrupts the action of other hormones that have a role in menstruation, including oestrogen and progesterone.
The lack of clinical research into this matter makes it difficult to recommend solutions that are proven to be effective. Making some dietary changes for better periods could play a part.
‘Gut lag’ may affect your digestive system
You’ve heard of jet lag, but you might not be aware that a similar effect known as ‘gut lag’ can impact digestion after long-distance journeys.
“The digestive system has its own internal clock, and when you rapidly cross time zones, this can temporarily fall out of sync,” says Dr Rossi.
“This can change the timing of gut-related hormone release, slow or speed up bowel movements and contribute to bloating, constipation or diarrhoea – this is because many digestive processes, including gut motility and the activity of our gut microbes, follow circadian rhythms.”
Dr Rossi has two key recommendations for minimising the undesirable effects of gut disruption during travel: pack some psyllium husk to relieve constipation and consider taking a microbial supplement to reduce your risk of traveller’s tummy.
Travel might slow down biological ageing
Recent research suggests that positive travel experiences might help you live for longer by slowing down biological ageing. This provides further evidence of what many of us who love a holiday have long believed: travel keeps you young!
Researchers at Edith Cowan University in Australia found that enjoyable travel can reduce entropy (which they define as disorder in the body that can lead to accelerated ageing and infirmity).
It’s worth noting that negative travel experiences can have the opposite effect, but if you’re lucky enough to have the ability and opportunity to hit the road, there’s a good chance that your body will share in the benefits. Time to book your next trip...
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Pete Wise
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