French Travel PlannerOvercoming Jetlag

Flying from the United States to France is much harder than France to the United States. This is because when you fly to France you lose time and more importantly you fly during the night and don't get much sleep on the airplane. Coming from the continental United States you will lose any where from 6 to 9 hours. That is a lot of time to lose and recover fast, I have been told that for each hour you lose your body takes one day to recover. So with that in mind here are a few ideas for overcoming jet lag.

Sun, sun and more sun- As soon as you get to France get out in the sun. This will tell your body that things have changed and start the process of getting it use to sleeping and saying awake at the right time. Take naps if you must, just not longer than an hour.

Sleep it off- If you arrive in France in the morning and are feeling very tired, sleep. Your body is in turmoil so let it heal by sleeping as much as it wants. I did this one time and it seemed to work okay, my first day in France was spent on the couch of a friends sleeping, for about ten hours. Doing this I was able to get up on time and go to work three days after arriving in France.

Get up with the locals- The idea here is to pretend that nothing has happened, so set that alarm for seven in the morning and sleep standing up, if you must sleep at all.

Let your body tell you- Get out and see some sites one you first day in France, more than likely you don't have a lot of time and you need to use your time not for sleep but for sightseeing. Maybe around four in the afternoon as seems to be my habit, sleep for a few hours or longer and then see Paris or whatever city you are in at night.