Part 2 of 3

Finally in 1995, we planned a trip for just the two of us – a cruise in the Caribbean. This was to celebrate our 15 year anniversary even though we were nearly a year past it. We had never been on a cruise before nor had we ever been out of the country. It felt a little intimidating but we were looking forward to the adventure. 

The first port of call was the island of Martinique in the French West Indies. I knew from my World Guide that there was at least one nude beach there, but I was too intimidated to even think about trying to get there and I wasn’t ready to talk to my wife about it either. Instead, with the directions from someone on the ship’s staff, we went ashore and headed for a resort area that we could reach by public ferry. Even then we were both still pretty nervous about trying to get around – neither of us spoke French. 

We got to our destination just fine and then had to go through a hotel to get down to the beach. I guess it was still early because there was hardly anyone there. We made ourselves comfortable on a couple of chairs under an umbrella and a hotel attendant soon came along and collected some money from us. We talked and looked around the area there and went for a swim. We were reveling in the fact that we were now international travelers touring a foreign country. After a while people (from the hotel there, I guess) gradually began to come down to the beach. We were back on our chairs when a group of girls (older teens I’m guessing) came down and occupied a group of chairs just down the beach from us. Nothing unusual about that ,but when I glanced down that way again a few minutes later, these girls were lounging in the sun and chatting and laughing like you might expect except for one thing – they were as topless as I was. I mentioned to my wife something about how I guessed it was true about topless beaches in the Caribbean. She glanced over and casually replied, “I guess so.” 

As the beach began to fill with people, it seemed that for women, topless or not was perfectly acceptable – not only with those who chose to be that way, but also with those who didn’t. This was our first experience to be in a culture that had such a drastically different custom of dress than what we were used to, yet once past the initial observation, it seemed…normal. Thinking back on it, my observations and thoughts of what I saw were not at all of a sexual nature (I’m happy to say) and I think it was because this custom of dress was simply the norm and therefore, people were behaving normally. It wasn’t about being noticed or attracting attention – it was just the norm – for all ages, for all body types, for both genders. It was as simple as that.

To illustrate how normal it was, there were several people going up and down the beach there selling clothing and jewelry. Among them was a young woman selling jewelry and wearing a two-piece swimsuit as she worked her way along the beach. At one point, I noticed that she was lying in the sun taking a break and had removed her top. Pretty soon she was selling again and wearing her top. 

To illustrate how easy it was to accept topless as normal, after going for a swim I came back to our umbrella to find that my wife had rolled her one-piece swimsuit down to her waist and was now one of the topless crowd – one of the majority. I expressed my approval along with my surprise and her response was, well, why not? I had to agree –those French girls certainly had nothing on her.

Another port of call on our trip was the island of St. Martin, also in the French West Indies. This was a particularly frustrating stop for me because I knew from the World Guide that the world famous Orient Beach was there. When we wert ashore, there were taxis lined up everywhere ready take people there. I suggested it to my wife, but she thought the offer to look at a timeshare along with all the touristy things they promised sounded more interesting so that’s what we ended up doing. We spent all of our onshore time at the beach outside of a resort on the Dutch side of the island. We had a good time there (after the high pressure sales pitch was over), but all the while I felt really frustrated and disappointed knowing that the most famous nude beach in the world was only a few miles away but I might as well have still been back home, because there was no way I could go there. Another golden opportunity missed and again it was my fault for keeping secrets and not communicating my thoughts and desires.  

The next chance for the two of us to get away came along a little over a year later. Our destination was a vacation area on a barrier island just off the coast of Florida. Our decision to go there was based on the recommendation of several of our friends that had been there before. I knew from reading the World Guide that there was a non-landed nudist group based there and it told about the beach where they gathered. The book gave directions on how to get there, but I couldn’t find it on any map and I had no idea if I could actually find the place or if I would even take the initiative to approach my wife about it. I was still very down on myself over St. Martin.

We loved this island right from the start. It just had a comfortable feel about it. We were staying in a condo that was not on the beach, so we had to drive anytime we wanted to go to the beach and that gave us more impetus to explore the island and visit different beaches. 

We started out at the public beach access nearest our condo. There were quite a few people on the beach there due to a lot of condo buildings in that area, but we didn’t consider it to be crowded at all. The overall environment there had a laid back feel to it. On a number of occasions, we noticed people speaking what sounded to us like German, giving us the impression that we were in a place possibly favored by foreign tourists. I made a number of observations as this was our first time to spend any length of time on a beach in the US. For one, more men of all ages and shapes wore Speedo type swimsuits and more women of all ages and shapes wore two piece swimsuits than what we were used to in the part of the country where we live. But it all seemed to be the norm and people acted completely normal about it. 

One afternoon as we were relaxing under our umbrella, there was a young couple not far from us getting ready to leave. Standing behind their umbrella such that her line of sight prevented her from seeing others (but not preventing us from seeing the rest of her), the woman removed her swimsuit top, picked up a tee shirt, and put it on. Instead of feeling like a peeping tom, I simply observed how practical and innocent her actions had been. I also observed in myself that not only had I not been looking around with the intention of spying on other women, when I did see this girl’s breasts, I didn’t think of it in a sexual way but rather I accepted it in much the same way as if I had seen a man doing the same thing. I realized that my mind was now conditioned away from associating simple toplessness with sexual thoughts and I attribute that to the toplessness we had experienced on the Caribbean beaches. This brought me to the important conclusion that it must have been the actual experience itself that conditioned me to see this in the proper perspective – to see it for the innocent mode of dress that it really was. In other words, I don’t think that any amount of reading about or thinking about women being topless on the beach without my actually experiencing it could have undone the mental link between toplessness and sex that had been there before.

After a couple of days at that beach, we began a process of moving around to visit other beaches - just picking them from a map of the island. It was probably the third or fourth day when the next beach in line to visit was one that was mentioned in the World Guide as being one of the parking spots for going on to the nude beach, although it was said to be a very long walk. The book also said that there was an area of this beach where there were many dead trees that had fallen along the shore and people allegedly sunbathed nude there among them.

As we were driving to that beach, I saw some of the landmarks stated in the directions given by the World Guide and it created a feeling of anticipation in me even though I had no plans to do anything about it. When we got there, this beach instantly became our favorite. It was part of a park so there were no houses or condos there. It had a natural beauty to it that was very conducive to relaxing and there were fewer people here as well. We still visited other beaches after this, but we always seemed to gravitate back to this one before the day was over. We soon began to refer to this one as “our beach”. 

We walked the beach shelling and enjoying the seascape a number of times each day including going up into the area where the dead trees had fallen into the water as described in the World Guide.  My wife would sometimes walk with me up there into that area and sometimes not. She didn’t have the appreciation of the beauty, quiet, and seclusion of it that I did. Whenever I was up there I looked around for signs of a path or trail that might lead to the nude beach, but I never did see anything that I thought might be it. A couple of times on the weekend, I walked up into the trees and on one of the times when my wife was with me we saw a couple of individual men sunbathing nude. We walked right past one guy sitting in a chair who was being so discreet about it that my wife didn’t even notice he was nude. 

Then late on that Sunday afternoon as we were relaxing on our towels, I noticed several people come down the beach from way up in the direction of “the sticks” – that’s what we had taken to calling the area where the dead trees were - and I wondered if these folks might be coming back from the nude beach. That was my guess because they were carrying beach bags and coolers (nobody else carried stuff that far) and several of them were wearing thong swimsuits; that and they just seemed to have this attitude - this air of freedom about them that I can’t really describe any other way. I can recall that there was a group of two couples, then another couple or two as well as several individual guys that came by at different times. Feelings of frustration came rushing back like I’d felt in St. Martin knowing that a nude beach must be close by, but that I wasn’t going to be able to go there. 

A few days later on the day to go home, we had a few hours we could spend on the beach before heading to the airport. We were on our beach and we were walking up the beach together. As we started into the sticks, I spotted a nude man walking along the beach up near the edge of the standing trees. He wasn’t sneaking around or acting like anything was out of the ordinary – he was simply walking along with nothing on. He wasn’t even carrying anything. When he was about even with us, he glanced in our direction. I waved and he waved back just like normal. My wife saw all of this, but wasn’t in any way alarmed by it. The man proceeded on a little farther to where the trees end and the beach opens up again, but then he turned back and casually walked back in the direction he came from. I had to admire his apparent confidence, but I was especially envious of the freedom that I assumed he must be experiencing by being nude out on the beach. I knew what it was like to be nude in nature from my previous experiences where I grew up, but I was envious of him being able to be nude and free out here on the beach. That to me seemed like it would be the ultimate experience in nude freedom. 

We were now far enough into the sticks that we were out of view of the open beach and at that particular moment there was no one else around. I said something to my wife about how this must be the place to be nude on the beach. She responded with “Apparently.” Then I said, “Do you care if I do it?”  She said, “Go ahead” in a way that was like she didn’t believe I really would and she was calling my bluff. But I wasn’t bluffing. I took a quick look around and then took off my swim trunks right then and there. Then she said, “Here” as she held out her hand indicating for me to give them to her. I’m still not sure why she offered to hold them for me, but I handed them over. I guess neither one of us knew quite what to do right after that. She went back to looking for shells along the waterline and I just walked along with her, taking in all these new sensations – physical and mental - of being nude out on the beach. But I was soon distracted from that goodness when, as I had feared would happen, I started to get an erection. Then everything was interrupted when my wife suddenly handed me my trunks and said that somebody was coming. I slipped them back on and as we headed back down the beach, we met the people that were coming. One of them was a woman who gave me a look and smirk that said she had caught me in the act, but I wasn’t bothered by it. Even though it had only lasted a few minutes, I had at last experienced being nude on the beach in a place where it was at least somewhat common even if not normal. I was still disappointed about not finding the alleged nude beach, but I felt good knowing that I had at least taken a step forward. I was also glad that my wife had been present when I did. 

Back home, I still didn’t do much to talk to my wife about my hopes and desires for simple nonsexual nudity. I did take advantage of any opportunity that I was home alone (they were few) to be nude. During the summer, I found a few secluded places out and about when I was running that I could be nude for brief periods, but having to constantly watch out for someone coming made it a less than satisfying experience. I remember working up the nerve to tell my wife about one of those times after I had returned home from a run on a Sunday afternoon. She responded with disgust, so I knew that wasn’t the way to go about talking to her, but the worst thing was that it also de-motivated me to even try. That’s not a valid excuse for not talking, but nonetheless I still didn’t do it. Another setback - continued secrecy – the pattern continued unbroken. 

We liked that place in Florida so much that about 18 months later we decided to go again. We stayed in a place on the beach this time, but we still wound up going to that favorite beach (our beach) nearly every day. This time I was more determined to find the nude beach referred to in the World Guide. Of course, I had not told my wife about my intentions nor did I have the courage to ask anyone where this beach was by name. I guess I still had it firmly entrenched in my mind that this was all about doing something wrong. The sad thing was that the only thing wrong with it was my secrecy and deceitfulness - and that was very wrong.

We spent most days on the beach relaxing and enjoying ourselves (as well as going out in the evenings for dinner). There was one day when we were up in the dead trees (the sticks) that I tried to talk my wife into exploring farther into the trees to see if we could find the trail to the next beach (that was how I put it). We didn’t get far before she wanted to turn back. I didn’t blame her – we didn’t have our sandals and the ground was a little rough as it led farther away from the beach. I tried searching a couple more times when I was up there by myself, but the trail just wasn’t clear enough to follow. It just seemed to fade out.

On one of the days of our trip we headed off island to go to a state park. This particular park is on an uninhabited island that can be reached only by boat. The ferry operators were taking an early boat over to the island ahead of the regular schedule and we lucked out and got to go with them. That put us on the island before most anyone else. We walked down the beach quite a long way to where the beach came to a point and that’s where we put up our umbrella. 

We started looking for shells and were finding lots of sand dollars. At one point, we I had gotten separated by a little ways as we looked for sand dollars. When I could see that there was no one else around, I slipped off my trunks. Then I continued slowly walking along just as before. I was amazed at how right it seemed not to be wearing anything out here. I wondered what my wife was going to say when she noticed, but when I glanced back to check on her, to my astonishment, there she was, also nude, walking along looking for sand dollars carrying her swimsuit just like I was. When she saw me looking at her, she just smiled and waved. I was thinking, ‘hey now this is progress,’ but it was short lived because as I walked back to join her, a small fishing boat suddenly appeared close to shore from around the point and we both got dressed again. 

A little later, we were both undressed again and were sitting under our umbrella having a snack when suddenly from around a curve up the beach came a man riding a bicycle. That was about the last thing I expected to see coming down the sand. We scrambled around trying to get back into our swimsuits while sitting down, but I’m sure he wasn’t fooled. We actually visited with him later, but nothing was said about that initial incident. Turns out, he had come on the main ferry and was the first of quite a few people to come wandering down to our end of the beach. 

It was several hours before we had the beach to ourselves again and when we did I was out of my trunks again and went straight into the water for a swim. What an amazing feeling to be in the water with nothing on, then just walk out of the water without any heavy dripping swim trunks hanging on you, and be dried off naturally in the sun and breeze. So amazing. Sensual, yes, but not sexual. I was glad that, except for when I first undressed after our arrival, I had no erections. I knew that any that might happen in this context were not sexually motivated, but because my motives for nonsexual nudity were just that – nonsexual, I didn’t want there to be any outward sign at all that would lead me or my wife to question my motives. 

My wife on the other hand, seemed to have just the opposite idea. Even when she was nude right after we first arrived, she had alluded a couple of times to sexual ideas. And now as I was coming out of the water, she was now nude and made sure I knew of her arousal. Although it was my intention to disassociate sex and nudity for myself here in this setting, I would have gone ahead with making love there except that the circumstances just weren’t such that it was safe to do so – too great a chance for people or boats to suddenly appear out of nowhere like they had before. I told her that I’d like to, but that we’d better not. She understood and agreed that it was too risky. That would have been a perfect lead in to talk to her about my ideas for simple nonsexual nudity, but yet I didn’t do it. We were having a great day out there and I guess I didn’t want to risk ruining it. Another missed opportunity for communication.

A day or so later during the trip, it was early afternoon on a Saturday and we were preparing to take a leisurely walk up our beach toward the sticks. I told my wife that I was going to take my sandals and explore the trails a little more up in the trees and ask if she’d like to join me. She said no but that she didn’t mind if I did it on my own. 

Up in the trees as I was more or less just wandering away from the beach trying to follow what might or might not be a trail, I ran into a guy coming back my way. I asked him if this was the way to another beach (that’s how I put it). He said, “You mean the nude beach?  Just keep going – you can’t miss it.” Yes! Now I was on to something. Suddenly I could feel the butterflies in my stomach. What would I find? What would I do when I got there? I didn’t know. I only knew to keep going so that I wouldn’t miss out again. It wasn’t long before I could begin to see the water up ahead through the trees. A little farther and I could see more fallen dead trees on the beach. Then I could see some people out there. I had even more butterflies now but I kept going. Finally I reached the edge of the beach. It looked like I was at the opposite end of “the sticks” section of the beach. There were dead trees right there where I was, but then it ended just a little ways beyond and the beach opened up again. 

There were maybe 20 or 30 people here on the beach in and among the trees – all men, all nude. I was finally here and I was determined. I went straight over to one of the dead trees lying fairly close to the water, took off my sandals; then took a deep breath and took off my trunks. There. Now what? I immediately stepped away from my stuff and into the edge of the water and started looking at the shells – or pretending to. I knew I had to do something to keep my mind occupied. Then I heard somebody say something like, “good job” or “way to go.” I glanced up and it was one of several guys standing there talking and yes, he was talking to me. Somehow I guess it was clear to others that I was new at this. I said thanks and that was that. 

Over the next few minutes along the waters edge there, I could feel my confidence establishing itself. I wasn’t paying much attention to the others around me nor they to me. I was simply enjoying being nude on the beach and in the water in a place where it was acceptable to be like this without having to constantly keep watch. It was a little while later that I glanced up the beach and saw that there was another somewhat larger group of people up there and it was about then that it began to dawn on me that it might be more than coincidental that were only men here where I was. Could this be a gay section of the beach? By now, I was pretty sure it was. But I didn’t panic; there was no need because there was no problem. I just looked around a little more and then decided to continue my exploration. I returned to my things and slipped my trunks back on, then headed on up the beach carrying my sandals. I would soon realize that getting dressed to do that wasn’t necessary.

As I walked out of the trees and into the open, I was then close enough to see that the other group of people ahead was nude, too, and that there were both men and women present. With my confidence already bolstered from the previous few minutes and from the other island a day or two before, I walked straight up the beach like I knew what I was doing all the while being acutely aware internally that I didn’t. But I knew it was important to keep my momentum going since I still had the nervous butterflies to deal with. As I continued up the beach I began to pass by others – a few at first and then more - and nearly all were completely nude. Of course, I couldn’t help but notice that, it being something I was so not used to at the time, but I concentrated on looking ahead to where I was going even though I wasn’t really sure exactly where that was. Finally, when I reached more or less the middle of the area where the people were spread out along, I stopped.

There was a kind of a sand shelf that ran along the beach there that had been created by the waves. It dropped abruptly a couple of feet and then sloped gradually on out to the water. It was below this shelf where I stopped walking and immediately slipped off my trunks and prepared to leave them and my sandals there out of the way on the shelf. I stood there for a minute or so calming my mind, collecting my thoughts and getting used to the situation. Form that point on, it was surprising how steadily my mind began to grow calmer and the nervousness began to disappear. As a result, I began to take in what was going on around me. I overheard bits of conversation from some that there had apparently been somewhat of a scare earlier that the authorities were coming to patrol. But that was now past and a number of people began to come out from the trees that stood a little ways back from the beach, making the size of the group bigger than I had initially thought. All told there were probably 50 or 60 people spread out along the beach there – all adults and pretty much all ages with the men maybe outnumbering the women slightly, but not by much. 

One of the first things I noticed was that almost everyone around me had a complete even tan - as in no tan lines whatsoever (quite unlike myself). I’d never been around that before and I was struck by how much more natural it seemed and how it didn’t delineate any areas of the body by making any one area stand out from another. Almost immediately I realized my eyes weren’t drawn to any one part of the body – even of the women – but that what I was seeing was the whole body at a glance.

Overall the general atmosphere seemed very relaxed. Some of the people knew each other and tended to congregate together while others – couples and singles – were spread out a little more sparsely along the sand. This beach definitely had a friendlier feel to it than the other regular beaches. 

As for observations about myself, I felt I was doing fine and it felt good to be moving forward in my desire for simple nonsexual nudity. My confidence and courage seemed firmly in place and I was determined (and hopeful) that my mind and body would not overreact to the presence of women. That was a serious concern even though I knew it should not happen because I was sure of my motives for being there, which were to experience the openness and freedom of simple nonsexual nudity in a place where it was normal and acceptable to do so. I was not here to study nude women – especially in a sexual context. I wasn’t in the habit of doing that anyplace else under any other circumstances and I had no intention of doing it here. I considered it a matter of character and of honoring my vow to “love, honor, and cherish” my wife. I had already decided that if I found myself failing in this area, I was going to leave immediately. And then right away I was tested.

As I was taking in all of the sensations, thoughts and emotions associated with being nude out here on the beach amidst all these others, out of the trees came two young women completely nude walking together slowly in the sand along the upper part of the beach such that they were about to pass near me. I guess there were just too many things about this particular situation that was too much too soon - more than I could take in stride and accept as normal all at once – not yet anyway. Here’s what I mean. I already mentioned the continuous tans that most people had. These two definitely had that - very dark solid tans under a glistening layer of sun screen. Both had body jewelry in both nipples – jewelry that because of the bright sunshine, stood out noticeably against the dark skin of their areolas that was nearly the same shade as the rest of their body. They also had belly-button jewelry. What was noticeably absent was pubic hair – there was none. Their tanned skin simply flowed straight down their abdomen uninterrupted until it reached the contours of their clearly visible feminine mounds and folds. And in the complete absence of even their natural covering, it was impossible not to notice the difference between them there. Also impossible to miss was the glint of more body jewelry embedded in that area as they walked casually by me. This was all completely new to me. As they passed by, I caught myself and hoped I hadn’t stared, at least not to the point of being glaringly obvious about it. I w as a little worried and embarrassed that maybe I had, but at least there were two of them so I was hoping I hadn’t focused on either one enough that they noticed.

As I hastily collected my thoughts, I realized that although I had reacted to the situation with surprise and even some shock, my thoughts were not the least bit sexually focused. That in itself was a relief, but an even greater relief was that I didn’t feel even the slightest sensation of an erection developing. Under the circumstances, this seemed to me like a true break through. I didn’t want to become over confident, but I felt that if I could get past those two, then maybe my mind and body were now truly getting on the right track to handle simple nonsexual nudity in the way that I knew it should. I glanced at the two women again now that they were walking away from me and thought, ‘I passed your little test’ even though I knew they were not there to have anything to do with me. I had to wonder if they intentionally used jewelry like that to draw attention to those areas of their bodies and if so, why? Then it occurred to me that when someone wears ear rings, I notice the ear rings and not the ears (if I notice anything) so maybe that’s the way this would eventually work, also.  Then a really silly thought crossed my mind: at least they have plenty of places to keep their keys.

Moving on, I left my stuff there and went into the water and swam. I walked up and down the beach looking at shells and sometimes picking up shells and throwing them out into the water. I felt free. I felt in control. I felt right. My observation of what was going on around me was that these were just regular people enjoying their day at the beach. Other than the fact that many of them seemed to know each other and often engaged in friendly conversation and banter, it was just like the rest of the beaches we had been on. I stayed about an hour before getting dressed and heading back. I didn’t talk to anyone (other than a simple hello) – not because I was afraid, but just because I really wasn’t there to socialize with anybody, at least not without my wife. 

When I got back to where my wife was, I told her that I had found the trail through the trees and found the next beach. I also told her that it was a nude beach and that there were nude people there and that I went nude, too. I couldn’t quite gauge the tone of her reaction to all that. She wasn’t angry nor did she show much interest. I said that I could show her where it was tomorrow and she just said “We’ll see” and that was the end of the discussion that day. It seemed like a start.

END - Part 2 of 3

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