Traveling the world is undeniably fun – but the plane ride? Not so much, especially for your skin. You skin can take a serious beating on long haul flights.
And while it’s tough to say you are an “expert” at anything, I have had quite a lot of experience in traveling long haul trips. Every year growing up my family and I would take a long haul trip to visit our family in Europe, which would result in no less than 14 hours on the plane each time.
As a kid, my mom would slather on some Nivea hand cream on my face (don’t ever do that, by the way, unless you want serious breakouts) and that would do it. (Isn’t it great being a kid?) Now that I’m older, though, with so many more other beauty and skin concerns (how I wish I could just swipe hand cream on my face and not worry!), that just isn’t an option anymore. Here are some travel beauty tips I’ve gathered over the recent years.
Before Boarding
First and foremost, moisturize your clean, bare face before boarding a flight (I really recommend against wearing makeup on a long flight).
Next, while getting dressed for your flight, remember to moisturize your body as well. Moisturize your legs, collarbone, neck, and arms before flight. If scents are your thing, look for a lotion with scents. Soothing scents always work best: try spritzing on a lavender or vanilla scent to help calm you down. Close your eyes, breathe in the beautiful scent, and relax.
On Board
While on the plane, it’s also important to maintain moisturized skin. There are many facial moisturizer sprays available today that you can use to freshen up your face mid-air, and I’d definitely recommend trying out. I would also recommend bringing moisturizer for the rest of your body, namely hands and legs. Hands get insanely dry and so do your legs, which make them dry and itchy, and have this scale-like appearance. Load up on lotion every once in awhile to banish scaly looking skin when you get off the plane! The same goes for your lips. The skin on our lips is very thin and delicate, and is one of the fastest to dry up and can get very, very dry and cracked in the cabin air. It’s best to skip the lipgloss and lipsticks and instead go for an intense moisturizing lip balm.
Below are a list of my must-haves on a plane, they are incredible moisturizing and after trying many, many products, these are my top picks:
- Clinique Moisture Surge: Introduced to me by my best friend, this is a cult favorite and is so easy to apply. Just close your eyes, stretch out your hand, and spray it onto you face. I like to do it every 2 hours (after every movie I watch, ha!) and it dries instantly – it’s like your skin just drinks it up.
- Vaseline Intensive Repair: Simply the best. I can actually apply it once on my legs and still feel it on my skin when showering so many hours later.
- Fresh Advanced Treatment Lips: This lipbalm is full of sheer butter, etc. (They come in other colors too, which I also wear daily).
- Kiehl’s Extra Strength Handcream: Again, one of the best. This one is a favorite and locks in all moisture.
Another thing you might want to try are sheet facial masks. I’ve seen a lot of women do this recently. When the lights go off, I’d be walking to the bathroom and see a pool of women before me with their masks on. It looks incredibly relaxing. Just apply a sheet mask (in others words, the easiest type of mask to work with) and it’s like a mini spa experience in the air. Twenty minutes later, skin is refreshed and plump with moisture.
After The Flight
As you are landing, I’d recommend using a couple of facial wipes to clean your skin as much as you can before finding yourself a shower, and then leave it “naked”. It’s best not to pile on makeup before leaving your flight because it hasn’t been washed in a while, and it will only cause clogged pores and breakouts. The best, really, if you’re concerned about how you look (but really, give yourself a break – you were on a long flight!), just apply some lip color and slip on a pair of sunglasses and tie your hair up; you’ll look fresher instantly.
After you do get to have a shower and wash your face, reload on the moisturizer (face, hands and body), and give your hair a good conditioning treatment if your hair tends to feel the effects from the flight, too. As far as makeup, for that day itself, try to avoid any powder based makeup products (powder foundation, powder blush, etc), as powder will dry out your face more and even emphasize the momentary dryness in your skin. Stick to tinted moisturizers, cream blush and cream eyeshadows until your skin ‘recovers’ from the flight.