Arrival day: push through or nap?
 

I'm wondering what experiences you've had with that first-day arrival in Europe from the US.

I keep hearing that you should try to push through the whole first day so that you acclimate to the time change faster, but I've only been successful at that once, when I was much younger. As an adult, if I arrive in the morning (European time), I can last until late afternoon or early evening before crashing. It does mess up the first day or so -- no fun being wide awake at 2am when the rest of the continent is asleep! -- but then it all seems to straighten itself out.

What are your thoughts? We're planning a 9am arrival in Manchester, England, and I'm thinking we might be better off to check a few things off our list (SIM cards, groceries for the next day's breakfast, etc.), then check into the hostel and nap for a couple/few hours. After that I'm thinking we can head back out in the evening and perhaps end the day later than usual so that we sleep soundly and are ready for the first full day.

One of my frequent-traveling friends suggested taking 5-Hour Energy as soon as we land to help soldier through the arrival day, but with a 9am arrival I don't know how that would work...have you tried this strategy? Would it be better to take it, say, around local lunchtime and hope to last another few hours?

Thanks in advance -- just trying to get the trip off to a good start. I appreciate hearing about your experiences.

We fly from the US west coast twice a year for our 1 month European vacation. We usually depart SFO around 2 to 4 pm. We have a big lunch with wine. We get on the plane & stay awake for a couple of hours. Then I take 2 1/2 ambien, put in ear plugs and wear an eye mask, & try to get several hours of sleep - which I usually do. We have a strong cup of coffee on the plane close to arrival time. When we get there, we "push on", but never a drive more than 2 1/2 hrs if we drive at all. We have a nice dinner at 8pm, I take 2 ambien, then off to bed. We've done this routine since 1999. I have ambien for the next 4-5 days.

Stu Dudley

We usually go west.
Last we came back we stayed awake until about 9 pm. So that we would wake at a normal time.

I'm a napper. We generally land, get to hotel, unpack, have celebratory drinks & maybe a snack, then sleep. We get up, shower and go to dinner. We might take a sleeping pill around 1am if we need it. After this we are reset & good to go for the rest of the trip.

Everyone's different, but personally I'm a mess for several days if I nap the day of arrival. I just stay outdoors as much as possible, move slowly, stop a few times for a coffee or tea, have a light dinner, and get to bed before 10 pm. Then I'm good to go starting the next morning.

I'll never forget my trip to Paris with my sister. We live in the Inland Northwest, so we have to travel from Spokane across the United States and then across the Atlantic. Also, the time difference between Spokane and European cities is 9 hours or more.

It was my sister's first trip to Europe, and she was so excited that she insisted we stay awake in Paris and do some sight-seeing. When we were on the bateau boat touring the Seine, she was wide awake and taking everything in.

I did my best, but I kept dozing off during the whole trip. It was not an enjoyable excursion for me.

Nowadays I have also noticed that when I stay awake after arriving, I don't feel well the first day. In addition, my internal clock is totally discombobulated, and I find myself needing to take naps for the next few days. My body knows that it is 2:00 a.m., no matter that the clock says it's 5:00 p.m.

I've just given up struggling. I take naps for the first couple of days. I think part of the trouble is my age. I don't remember having jet lag when I was younger.

P.S. It's even worse when I return home. I usually return to local time quickly, but it takes about a week for my body to recover.

If you're getting the tram from the airport, as in your previous post, then you'll be at your hostel by around 11:15am.(Delays allowing) Maybe you should stretch your legs once you've checked in and walk up to the Sainsbury's store at the bottom of Regent Road that I mentioned in your other post. That should take you around 10 minutes or so and you should be back not long after noon.

I think I'd catch some sleep for a couple of hours in the afternoon just to keep me going and then follow your plan to go to bed a little later. That always works for me with overnight flights. Let me know if you need any other info for the time you're in Manchester.

We travel from the east coast of the U.S. so we generally arrive between 7:00 a.m. and noon. Our goal, once we can get into a hotel room, is to take a nice shower and nap for a short time - no more than 90 minutes. This helps us get through the balance of the first day and we are generally good to go for the balance of the trip. I'm thinking limmy's idea of a pre-nap drink should be added to our routine. Thanks.

I think you should find a way to stay out in the sun. The worst jet lag I had came from being indoors on arrival and staying there. Gets the body to see the sun and it starts to catch up.

I never nap. I get what sleep I can and stay up until 830 or 9 the first evening. I have a terrible time getting up from naps and it's just easier to stay awake. I choose something low key but interesting for the first day so that I won't be tempted to doze off. Personally, I get a second wind when I'm so tired that I'm just not tired anymore.

Sorry, I should have said "I get what sleep I can on overnight flights".

I, too, sleep some on the plane, stay awake & walk after arrival, then go to sleep as close to local bedtime as I can manage. If I "napped", I'd stay asleep and wake in the wee hours and it would take me days longer to adjust.

Agree with StCirq. Everyone is different. However, her findings are my findings.

Napping on the first day can delay your transition to the new time zone. It is much better to push through to an early dinner - perhaps 7pm instead of 9 - and try to spend time out in the sunshine (if you have any) to make the transition faster.

I stay up until normal bedtime (or as close to it as possible). That helps my body adjust quicker to the new time zone. I don't get much sleep on overnight flights, so exhaustion helps me go to sleep, and stay asleep, until the next morning.

I've traveled to Europe all my life, parents were both airline employees, so I spent a lot of my life traveling on trips with them. The number one rule my parents and all their airline friends had: as soon as you arrive in Europe take a 2-4 hour nap- NO MORE. If you try and push though the day, make sure you sleep on the plane!

We take a 4 hour nap when we arrive in the morning, then spend the rest of the day enjoying the culture, have a great dinner then go to bed at a somewhat reasonable hour. Wake up ready to seize the day!

Enjoy!

"...as you arrive in Europe take a 2-4 hour nap..."

With a morning arrival and check-in often delayed until afternoon, how does one nap "in the morning"?

I envy people who can sleep on the plane. Being able to do that would certainly help the transition to a different time zone.

I recall one trip where I was determined to sleep on the flight. I took Melatonin and (maybe Bendryl), used earplugs, an eyemask, and a u-shaped pillow for my neck. I think I slept for about an hour. Maybe two, but not enough to help me stay awake and alert when I landed in Frankfurt.

I don't sleep well on the plane but find, if I nap, I just prolong my adjustment. I try to stay outside as much as possible the first day as I think the angle of the sun helps reset my "internal clock", have an early dinner, crash around 9-10 PM and I'm fine for the rest of the trip.

Wish it was that easy on return!

"I think you should find a way to stay out in the sun."

The OP's travelling to Manchester. So finding sun will be the first challenge.

But DO realise everyone's different. I recently slept dreadfully on an eastbound overnight from Cuba only a few days before the winter solstice. So by the time I'd changed planes at CDG and driven home, it was dark already.

But I went to a local board meeting that night, and my brain, tolerance and insight into the issues discussed worked properly. Back home, a quick plate of carbonara and I slept like a baby till 0600 GMT. Nary a lag.

Maybe I'm getting old. Maybe Air Frog was just being mean with the booze. But I've noticed that lags get rarer and rarer the older I get.

If I can sleep on the plane I should be able to stay up until local bedtime (say 10:00 to 11:00), but if I fly economy I only get a few cat naps and there is no way I can last that long. I eat a light lunch and go to sleep for two to three hours. When I get up I shower, eat dinner with everyone else and go to bed at 11:00 or so. Then I'm synced by the morning. (Note, I'm talking about flying US east coast to Europe.)

"I've noticed that lags get rarer and rarer the older I get."

It's been said, everything is relative. Maybe brain fog is the new normal, so less lag, comparatively speaking.

My strategy for a transatlantic flight is to stay up all day and all night before I get on the plane - no stimulants, just excitement and leaving the packing for the last minute, which keeps me occupied.

I can never sleep on a 9+ hour flight until maybe the last hour before landing. But when I do land, I have all my wits about me and am able to stay awake until the "new normal" bedtime.

Personally, I think you might be wasting money on energy boosters or sleep aids. Jet lag is not the end of the world, unless you have a severely limited amount of time to get a whole lot of things done.

If you find that you are really exhausted when you arrive, have a light snack and go to bed. Set an alarm for whenever you want to get up. You might think that it's a waste of time to be sleeping, but if you try to "power through" the day/night, you might make yourself and everyone around you miserable. It's important to remember that this is also the time when most visitors make costly errors with money or end up getting pickpocketed.

Stay awake until 9pm or 10pm local time or suffer the residual effects of jet lag for several days. Your choice.

My usual routine after a fitful (always) sleep on a transatlantic flight is to drop my bags at the hotel, and inquire hopefully about early check-in (usually denied, these days). I get some lunch, check in, and take a nap. Nothing feels quite as good as those clean sheets -- except maybe the shower afterwards. Then it's up for some late afternoon walks until drinks and dinner. Works for me.

I could take thirty ambient and I couldn't sleep more than 3 hours on the plane. I nap , stay up until 10 local time , am tired the next day but serviceable. I nap the second day too and by the third day I am acclimated.
But everyone is different.

Neither of us sleep well on planes, but we do try to doze a little if we can.
Returning home from the US we stay awake. Inevitably I have to do some food shopping and stuff like that, but take it easy. We go to bed a little earlier than normal, and aim to get up early the next morning. We used to be fine then, but as we get older it takes a little longer, but after two nights we are fine.
The one time we did nap it took nearly a week to get over the jetlag.

Everyone is different and you just have to deal with it however you can.

'Stay awake until 9pm or 10pm local time or suffer the residual effects of jet lag for several days. Your choice."

What part of "everyone is different" do you not get? I nap, I am synced by the morning.

I fly from Seattle and I can't sleep on planes.

I always nap in the afternoon for a couple hours the first few days. If I don't I'm a zombie for the entire trip. If I take a couple days to get onto local time, then it works out a lot better for me.

Napping FOR ME is what gets me over jet lag and into the local time adjustment the quickest.

Wine also helps ;-)

Count me in the nap camp.

I fly from the US west coast, so a morning arrival in Europe means I'm arriving in my body clock's middle of the night. I also can't sleep sitting up in economy, no matter what I do. There's no way I can stay up another 12+ hours without sleep, so I rest, usually not much more than an hour or two. Without it, I get physically ill. I nap, then go out, then try to sleep at normal bed time, usually waking about 4 am on the first full day.

Every flight is the same for me. Whether it's duration is to be 45 minutes or 10 hours, I get drowsy shortly after take-off, my eyelids weigh about 12 pounds, and I fall dead asleep ... for all of 20 minutes. I am then wide awake for the rest of the flight.

I've tried boozing, not boozing, eating, not eating, listening to music, watching movies, reading, finding someone boring to talk to, taking sleep medication, doing nothing, counting sheep, etc., etc., etc. Nothing works. After my little nap, I'm done.

The one good thing is that, upon arrival in Europe, I am so wired that I can usually go all day without a drowsiness problem. I'll eat a big dinner with wine, then sleep like the dead that night and wake up raring to go the next day.

If we feel like napping we nap.

If we feel like staying awake we stay awake.

I don't sleep at all on a plane. Can't fall asleep in a sitting position no matter how tired I am. But I usually hit the ground running and try to walk and stay outside all day. No naps for me. They say the sun helps jet lag and I think that is true.
I do hit the bed at about 9 pm or maybe a little earlier and then get a good nights sleep.

This is all fascinating -- thanks for sharing your experiences.

There are four of us and it's likely that each of us will react differently. Two of us can nap just about anywhere, even standing up as long as we have a wall to lean against. One doesn't need much sleep and is up at dawn (or predawn) 365 days a year. The other is a near-chronic insomniac who will probably be most in need of naps or any sleep he can get.

Thanks again for your tips and travel history. Much appreciated!

I never sleep on the plane so do take a short nap after I arrive, and that works for me. However, my flight for upcoming June trip leaves PIT very late, arriving at CDG around 11:30 am.--I was very surprised to see this, and here in Pgh., this is the only non-stop option. Not sure how this will play out and am wondering why all of a sudden Delta changed the flight times. The return is late in the day, too.
Always so envious of everyone else in cabin fast asleep while I am reading; a very lonely feeling, despite being with how many people stuffed in like sardines!

There's no one-size-fits-all answer. Some people are more affected by jet lag than others, some are more Type A than others and will barrel through no matter how they feel. I'm in the napping camp because I just feel better that way, and if it takes me 2-3 days to acclimate to a new time zone, so be it. I just sleep late and spend my afternoons out in the light as much as possible. Once or twice I thought I had gotten away without problems when I slept well the first night, but the second day it hit.

My husband feels tired and can't sleep at night for the full nine days it takes for his body to get used to being nine time zones away from home. He falls asleep about 4 AM and sleeps till 11. That's one reason we never go to Europe for less than 3 weeks, it just isn't worth the physical and psychological strain.

<a near-chronic insomniac>

That's me. And I believe those folks suffer the worst from jet lag and the time change.

I am traveling from the east coast so much better than the west coasters. I take 5mg of ambien and sleep on the plane. I also set my watch to the correct time of my arrival destination. I love traveling in the spring and summer and early fall when the day light hours are still long. That helps me to stay awake. I leave my blinds open and wake with the light of day. I only have trouble with altitude if we land and go right to the mountains. I like to gradually work into that now. Give me a day in Munich first.

I hit the ground running and don't go to bed till normal time. I am not wasting any vacation time sleeping or taking a nap but I am an east coaster so less of a time difference.

As flying gets more and more cramped, I find I harder to sleep on a plane, though I do take a pillow, and,a really comfortable eye shade, and ear plugs.

on arrival at my hotel I generally find it helpful to get a good cup of coffee or tea and something to eat and to walk around a bit. I keep to a light sightseeing schedule that first arrival day, and just get my bearings if i am somewhere new.

there have been times I just need to lie down for an hour or less, and just stretch my back out flat on the mattress, and there is nothing wrong with a short nap if that is what my body needs. I do try to stay up until at least 9pm, and then a relaxing hot shower and off to bed within the hour.

i may get up in the middle of the night the first night but after that i find i am active enough to straighten it out

i am a proponent of water on the plane and no alcohol which is dehydrating. have your drinks after you land