Wreck Beach, Vancouver
The sign says "Welcome to Wreck Beach." Located in Vancouver, British Columbia, it's the oldest and largest nude beach in Canada.
I was not able to find out why it's called Wreck Beach. Presumably there had been one or more shipwrecks nearby. I think this photo was taken on another beach, but I couldn't resist posting it here, because it was labeled "Old wreck." You decide which one is the old wreck.
The beach is adjacent to the campus of the University of British Columbia (UBC). Not surprisingly, a large percentage of the beachgoers are UBC students. It must be nice for the students to have a nude beach right next door.
The beach is sandy, as evidenced by this guy who seems to have forgotten to bring a beach blanket or towel to lie on.
There are even vendor kiosks on the beach like this one where you can buy food and drink without concern about being naked, because the vendors are naked, too.
The beach is very large (nearly 5 miles long) and much of it looks unspoiled. You'd never know you were next to a major city. The beach is at the bottom of a forested cliff, with long stairways descending from the UBC campus just above.
This headline could have been worded better. Nudists had no problem with erections. In 2004, the university proposed building four 20-story residential towers on the edge of the campus above the beach. The tops of the towers would have been visible from the beach above the trees, and the nude beach would have been visible from the upper stories of the towers.
An organization called the Wreck Beach Preservation Society conducted naked protest demonstrations against the building of the towers. Above, society members on the beach raise their fists in protest. They weren't worried about students spying on the nude beach from the upper floors of the towers. What they objected to was the visibility of the towers from the beach. Previously, on the beach you were completely removed from any sight of the city and had the feeling of being out in nature.
Despite the protests, the towers ended up getting built. The height was reduced from 20 stories to 17 and 18 stories, but the tops of the towers are visible from the beach.
The Wreck Beach Preservation Society continues to maintain the beach. It's very much a community organization. To raise money, it holds an annual Bare Buns Run on the beach, a 5K race. Here are some of the runners gathering before the race in 2011.
And they're off!
This guy, Bradley Gates from Seattle, won the Bare Buns Run in 2015.
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The beach faces west. And so we bid farewell to Wreck Beach with this scenic sunset view.
6 comments:
Nude beaches are great.
That sounds like a really neat place. If I lived anywhere near it I would visit it often.
What's the water temperature? (I'm worried about shrinkage if I get wet.)
It's cold, so you don't see many swimmers. At its warmest, in July and August, it's only about 58 degrees F.
For me, 58 degrees Fahrenheit is wet suit water, so there wouldn't be much of interest to see.
Just after the tide comes in, on a sunny summer the water can be in the mid seventies for awhile.
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