Tag: beach

Marathon

by αNaturist, posted in active naturists

 ελληνικά

In times when the Olympic torch has just been brought from Greece to London Olympics, it only makes more sense to post about one of my favorite places for camping, which bears the name of Marathon. That is where Persians attempted to invade Greece… and from where, allegedly, the courier ran all the way to Athens to tell the news of victory of the Greek army. This story, in turn, inspired the Marathon race! But I think not many people know that the beach where Persians once disembarked their warships is nowadays a perfect place for running. Given that even modern Greeks are quite easy with nudity and the beach is never crowded, you can run the way Ancient Greek athletes did – naked!

This is how this place looks from the plane:

Marathon is a little over 2-hour ride from buzzing Athens, but to get to the wilder part of the beach, you’ll have to walk from the bus station along the beach for more than an hour. (That is if you don’t have a car.) However, it is totally worth it. It’s a great weekend escape, and we often went there to camp overnight.

It’s easy to find a nice cozy spot for you tent.

So, there is not only a nice beach but also an old pine forest

with a pond

and numerous trails to wander around.

Scarcely growing old pines were perfect for hanging a hammock.

It was a lightweight variety, but still cozy enough to chill out, feeling the sea breeze all over body. I was learning Greek with a book, but not for too long as you can see…

Other “facilities” at the beach include a couple of metal platforms that are not in use anymore but are still stable and provide nice views over the beach.

But why stay on the beach all the time, if there is a forest next to it?

We were exploring whereabout of the ancient battleground in full tranquility and…

full nudity too 🙂

Haven’t I mentioned tranquility?

And of course we didn’t just walk and sit there. We also played beach bats during day,

and at night we tried a fast version of badminton, ‘Speedminton’, completed with glow sticks in the shuttlecocks. To see each other, we also decorated ourselves with glow sticks.

Then we also attached glow sticks to frisbee, which made it look like UFO in the night sky. Too bad our cameras couldn’t catch it, but it was quite a sight!

Another time, we ventured for a long run forth and back along the beach; wet sand was compact enough to run comfortably. Just a few patches have some colorful pebbles instead of sand.

If all that is not enough for your entertainment, there is also a bunch of friendly stray dogs that are happy to keep you company.

Spiaggia di Guvano, hidden beach in Northern Italy

by αNaturist, posted in active naturists

 italiano

This post comes from one of our devoted readers in Italy. I just wrote about a ‘hidden gem’ in Athens, as well as a remote beach that you can reach through a tunnel in Sitges, Spain, but it looks like Italy offers something of that sort too.

Spiaggia di Guvano is a gorgeous nude beach in the national park of Cinque Terre, La Spezia in Liguria.

To get there, walk from Corniglia train station in the direction of the village. Don’t go up the stairs, walk down, turn to the right and walk in the dark abandoned train tunnel. The access to the tunnel is free. Old information about the charge is no longer true.

But you will need a flashlight. After 15 minute walk you will find this gorgeous beach. It is usually very quiet and peaceful. Always nude, free and happy!!!

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[that sounds like a fun way to get to a beautiful beach!]

New season at Fort Tilden

by αNaturist, posted in active naturists

With this miserable weather in NYC in the last couple of days, I can’t help sharing that we actually opened the beach season two weeks ago at Fort Tilden.

I already mentioned that we went there on an unusually warm day last November, so it was only more pleasant to come there on an unusually warm day in April and enjoy the first rays of sun and awakening nature.

Although it is autumn that is usually acclaimed for diversity of color palette, the spring forest of Fort Tilden looked very multicolored too.

We first hid from the wind behind the dune but then ventured to the beach itself, but didn’t really dare to enter water.

… there wasn’t only awakening nature, though. That dried horseshoe crab found its new identity as mask 😎

beaches of Sitges

by αNaturist, posted in active naturists

Did you think that was it when I wrote about beaches of Barcelona? Well, almost. There is actually a lovely town of Sitges nearby, and guess what, it also has two naturist beaches.

Unlike in Barcelona though, those beaches are more remote and in a more natural setting. You would need to walk through the town’s narrow streets and then by the esplanade for an hour or so, and it is definitely a very nice stroll to do, unless you are can’t wait to dip in the sea. In the end of the esplanade, you’ll need to find a trail between the railway and sea, and continue in the same direction.

You will have some nice sea views to the left and a pine forest to your right; there’s lush Mediterranean vegetation, including dwarf fan palm, which is one of only two native European palm species (another one being Cretan date palm).

When you reach the beach, if you have any doubts on whether it is a nudist beach, there is a conspicuous sign saying that it is actually the first gay nudist beach if the world (since 1930’s).

When I was there in 2007, there was bar at the first beach, but on the second visit we saw a bar only at the second beach, which is right next to it.

But we just saw the absence of the bar as an opportunity to pose on its ‘ruins’, that were almost as picturesque as their ancient counterparts 🙂

And the platform where the bar used to be also provided nice views.

We camped overnight and woke up just before sunrise for a delicious fruity breakfast.

By the way, you can get to that forest not only crossing the railway but also through the tunnel under it. If you look through the tunnel towards the sea, it seems as if someone is inviting you to the naked Wonderland.

We need more of those portals that would transfer us to some nice beaches… any time of the year 😎

beaches of Barcelona

by αNaturist, posted in active naturists

Barcelona is an ultimate tourist destination with countless sights of interest, be it history or art, beautiful views, gastronomic delights, vibrant night life and, of course, beaches. Now, what other major city can boast with a naturist beach in its central area? And not just one, but two!

One beach is located in the southern part of the hip Barceloneta area and is called Sant Sebastià. You can see it on the right side coming down by cable car from park Montjuïc.

Isn’t it great to strip down and dip in the sea after all that sightseeing? The location is especially perfect if you go there after checking out the Olympic site and city news from Montjuïc. That’s what we did.

Another well known naturist beach is Mar Bella. It is a little further away from the historic centre, but you can see the famous ‘Egg building’, for example. It also has a dune with tall grass, which gives it a bit more natural and secluded feeling.

All beaches within the city boundaries have showers, which is useful if you want to continue exploring the city straight after the beach.

Both naturist beaches of Barcelona are full of locals and tourists but are not overcrowded.

You will be most certainly offered a ‘masaje’ right on the beach; we thought it was a good idea, but just did massage to each other instead.

The clothing optional section is big enough for a walk

or even a short run.

But when the sun was high we of course went to swim

or simply relaxed in the breeze

and in water.

Well, actually the sea was quite rough, so it was difficult to relax in water and we mostly played in waves.

Which in the end was a lot of fun!

Thumbs up to Barcelona’s liberal attitude! Actually I read that some people took it one step further and were even walking naked on the streets, but unfortunately the new mayor was apparently looking for some ways to distract people’s attention from economic problems and proposed a law forbidding even walking topless in the city (even for men). Let’s hope the trend will be reversed soon, otherwise we’ll loose just about the only big city with naturist sea beaches in the centre.

Fort Tilden, NYC

by αNaturist, posted in active naturists

I’ve written about a beach at Fort Tilden and its abandoned bunkers previously, but I can’t help sharing some more experiences and photos from that place last year.

Fort Tilden is not an official clothing-optional area, although I always wonder how come it isn’t possible to be clothes-free just anywhere in “the land of the free”?! Well, you’ve got to be brave sometimes.

Well, Fort Tilden beach rarely gets crowded, especially off-season, so it’s a great naked escape from the city on those surprisingly warm and sunny days, like we had last November.

It was a a perfect time to wander in the dunes and thickets of trees that were ready for winter sleep.

And yet the sun was quite strong still and made everything bright and alive.

When the clouds came in the afternoon it got pretty chilly, but we couldn’t resist the last possibility for skinny-dipping in the ocean before the winter would take over.

But even in summer you can usually find a spot without too many people, and you can always hide behind the fence that goes along the beach.

And there are some logs that can serve as a perfect naturist lunch table :p

Another time I came there on weekday in July and it was also almost empty, so I felt free and comfortable enough to fool around and practice some simple acrobatics exercises and stretching.

I was definitely into cartwheels and handstands that day,

and the soft and smooth sand was just so perfect for that.

I made some bridges too.

Then we found a coconut. We imagined it was brought by currents all the way from South Florida, where were in May.

It was a fantastic day, very relaxing (in an active naturist way). It is always hard to believe that you are still within New York City borders there, but you if you need a reminder, just go to those abandoned bunkers.

I think I will be coming there again and again!

 

Sea is the cradle of life, not a trash bin!

by αNaturist, posted in active naturists

I already complained about butts on the beach (of course I mean cigaret butts), as some people think it’s totally fine to throw them in the sand, but this cartoon will hopefully make you think twice if you want to throw some garbage in the sea itself.

It was kind of painful to see a plastic bag floating at the coral reef in the Red Sea in Israel, and that was one of the cleanest waters I have swum!

How to turn your friend into a nudist + Moving naturally at Jones Beach, NY

by αNaturist, posted in active naturists

Last summer I discovered yet another naked beach not far from New York City: a remote part to the east of Jones Beach. It’s a long (at least 15 min) walk from the main part/bus stop/parking, but given that it’s a walk at the beach, you can just as well enjoy this part of the deal. It’s much closer and easier to get to by public transport than the Lighthouse beach and is almost twice cheaper than the ferry to Sandy Hook, two official nudist beaches in NYC area. So I went there quite often and brought some of my friends visiting during summer. Most of that remote part of Jones beach is rather empty, except for a short stretch that gets busy on the weekends.

Natasha was eager to try her yoga poses at the beach, but for some reason she wasn’t ready to get rid of her clothes, although the idea of naturism is not foreign to her. I thought she just needed some booze boost.

Well, that menacingly blue concoction that we bought at the bar at the main part of Jones beach was non-alcoholic (and maybe that was why it failed to work).

The next step was to turn her upside down,

and after a couple of such twists, she turned into a nudist 😉

Not only did she let off her inhibitions,

she also braved the waves, that were quite rough on that day!

There was a couple of unexpected boomers, but it was part of the fun.

Since that remote part of Jones Beach is relatively empty, it’s perfect for jogging.

Once I brought there my new acquaintance Pétur, who is an instructor of MovNat in Iceland. MovNat (abbreviation of ‘moving naturally) is a system of movement skills that is based on natural patterns (taking into account our development – how toddlers start moving, evolution and comparative biology – how other animals move, etc.) as opposed to many modern running and fitness techniques that use artificial patterns (e.g., ‘hi tech’ shoes, all kinds of crazy gym equipment). Their logo is ‘Explore your true nature’, so needless to say, the first time I heard about it, I thought it should be done without clothes.

And there I was, learning to ‘run naturally’ at the Jones Beach. I’m definitely planning to explore more of MovNat in the future.

Naked Spring Bash with Florida Young Naturists

by αNaturist, posted in active naturists

This post was actually about to be published in my old blog, but right when I clicked the ‘publish’ button, Google suddenly deleted my blog… irrevocably. Well, enough complaining, now the blog is back, and several months after the first attempt this post is finally out! It is actually a good time, because Florida Young Naturists group has just announced (through their Facebook page, their website is not updated) the next Naked Spring Bash in April this year. So here is the original text, I leave it unchanged:

One of the reasons why I haven’t posted last weeks was because Joe visited me, and we went to South Florida for few days and had a lot of naked fun in the sun. We actually spent most of our time there naked: the CouchSurfing hosts we stayed with were also nudists, we went to the famous Haulover Beach (that is where the World Record Skinny-Dip took place) and got a chance to swim in the buff in a couple of other places, but most strikingly we visited a nudist colony Sunsport Gardens for the Naked Spring Bash organized by Florida Young Naturists. I came across their website a couple of years ago and thought it would be fantastic to join the group of naked peers that organized numerous fun events. I was reminded about FYN once again at the Nude Year’s Eve, as two of its members were there as well. The program for the Naked Spring Bash sounded really cool and after the long and cold winter we were craving for the sun and warmth, so it was amazing that Joe and I could go there together.

Too bad we didn’t get in this video, but they’re right, you can do all kind of fun things there!

The event included all kinds of activities.

I loved the drum circle around the fire on the first night. There was a dozen of drummers and other people were dancing around the fire. I got a frame drum of pandeiro type, the same as we use in capoeira, which I practice, so I could play and dance at the same time. And of course there was body art.

Joe got Sun and Moon from me,

but he took an easy path and “painted” handprints on me 🙂

Spring Bash participant were given a free spot for camping by the pond, and when we woke up, we got a chance to meet a couple of its friendly dwellers.

Then we went for a walk around the gardens with beautiful tropical and subtropical plants.

The tiny island in the pond was quite picturesque. Then there was some pool time and lunch, naked lunch of course. I was disappointed though, that they mostly provided fast-food and served it on single-use ware. I’d expect a naturist venue to be at the frontier of health- and eco-consciousness.

In the afternoon, there was a short excursion through the bit of tropical forest that belonged to Sunsport Gardens. We were very pleased to find this forest with many native plants of South Florida, and we went there on our own a couple of times again.

In a couple of places there were tables and benches, so you could have a quiet lunch in the forest as well.

The plants were diverse, there were some bamboos, but most of the forest was pine and palm trees,

some of which we tried to climb.

As to the Spring Bash itself, there were also volleyball matches, sauna, disco… but we were too busy enjoying it to take pictures 😉

On the last day of the Spring Bash, most of the people went to Haulover Beach.

But besides having nice company at the beach, when we went for a swim we were accompanied by a school of small fish… Either they mistook us for their parents or thought we’d simply provide them shelter from sharks 🙂

In any case, they followed us for half an hour!

I was quite surprised to find out that Haulover Beach was just one of two official clothing-optional beaches in South Florida.

But when we were driving around we found a couple of secluded spots in mangrove forests, where we went skinny-dipping too.

famous Black’s Beach!

by αNaturist, posted in Uncategorized

In the mid-November, I was lucky to go with my new colleagues for the biggest conference in my field, the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, and that time it was held in the sunny San Diego. Of course, it wouldn’t have been me, if I hadn’t planned to visit a nudist beach there, especially such a famous one as Black’s Beach. And I was double lucky that on the warmest day during my stay, when it was over 25ºC, the program seemed the least interesting so I skipped most of the day and headed to the beach (see the map for exact location).

As soon as I reached, it was pretty clear why this beach is so famous: it is, obviously, one of the biggest clothing-optional beaches and the view from the cliffs is stunning! It reminded me of the beaches of Meco in Portugal and Ga’ash in Israel.

I was surprised that on such an unusually warm day for November it was relatively empty, although it was Sunday, but I noticed some naked sunbathers immediately.

There are several trails leading down, and apparently I chose not the easiest one, but it was fun.

And I saw some lizards on the way down, apparently the enjoyed the sun too.
Soon I was walking on the soft beach sand, and look how the waves create a beautiful ornament of black and gold.
Then I saw that besides sunbathers there were surfers too!
But not naked :-/
Well, the water wasn’t too warm… But actually, first time I heard of Black’s Beach was because of the Nude Surfing Event. (check this link for more info)
Here is a video of one of the surfers.
Now, I’ve found that they actually arrange naked surfing lessons from July till September! I want to do that!!!
… but coming back to my calm day at the Black’s Beach, I was looking for a nice spot to lie down. I stayed near bushes and soon found that I had some neighbors: a rabbit (could not manage to take a photo of it) and a California ground squirrel that was quite tame and obviously was attracted to my nuts. (I mean I had some almonds with me 🙂

But then I got to know a bit more communicative neighbor, local visitor Alex. We chatted for a while, and it was him who disillusioned me by saying that such a hot day was not common that time of the year even in Southern California… But I still thought to myself that I might have made a mistake not applying for job at Salk Institute which is located practically on top of Black’s Beach, hehe. The idea that one can walk to such a beautiful beach for a lunch break sounds tantalizing! I did go to a lake for lunch breaks in my first year in Berlin until our lab moved, but even then my work was not that close to a naturist retreat like here.

Later in the afternoon I went jogging all along the beach and this gave me the real impression of how huge the beach is! But, apparently not all beach is officially a clothing optional area. When I ran in the northern direction one elderly man waived to me and told that I was way beyond the nude-friendly area and might get fined! If I understood correctly, the clothing optional part ends to the north of these rocks. But there was no sign. In any case, I didn’t feel bad, as only 2 or 3 people saw me in that section of the beach and there were either coming from or heading to the clothing-optional part, so I doubt they would be shocked by seeing a naked jogger.
Other people that I met gave me much more pleasant news. I saw one guy practicing some capoeira moves, but unfortunately he had to leave soon. I still haven’t mentioned that I did swim there too. The water was a little chilly, but I could stand it for 20-30min, amongst few others. And then, the only neighbor of mine, who went for long swims too, was coming from the sea almost crying. Don’t worry, he wasn’t bitten by a shark, those were tears of happiness as he saw a school of dolphins right next to him! He said it was one the most beautiful moments in his life, and I was very disappointed at myself that I left the ocean just about 10min earlier… I have swum with dolphins once, but that was in murky waters of Rio Negro in the Amazon basin so I couldn’t really see them underwater…
And when I was going back at sunset I saw a group of people playing volleyball, in the buff of course. This beach certainly seems to be perfect for many kinds of naturist activities 🙂

Before I was going to wear my clothes, I saw a threatening warning ‘Unstable Cliffs. Stay Back’
And I did so and enjoy one of the most beautiful sunsets 😎

One of the next (colder) days, I went there again with my colleagues for a short hike in Torrey Pines Park. When we went down to the beach I took some more photos, like this one with giant algae brought by waves on the shore.

And these are sandpipers; the smaller ones always run somewhat clumsily trying to escape the waves, while the bigger one stay calm.
And once in a while there were flocks of (probably) pelicans…
So overall, Black’s Beach seems to be perfect for nature lovers and active beach-goers. I hope to go there again, perhaps for a class of naked surfing!