Oops!... I did it in Valalta

I
Thursday 17th August 2000

It is 6p.m. and it's very hot. Driving in my car I feel like if I was inside an oven. I feel that way since hours. The empty road goes through a land of green and yellow and suddenly ends after a curve. At last I am here!
   A white bar closes the entrance of the nudist camp Valalta, placed 12Km North from Rovinij, Kroatia. I park my car and get off. I am very sweaty, my t-shirt is wet, drops fall down from my forehead to my sunglasses: that happens to those that travel without a/c in South Europe for 8 hours in August. The fresh seabreeze gives me relief, so I walk to the white small building by the entrance, hoping they will let me in. Oh yes, I mean it! I am alone and I am a male: owners of nudist resorts seem not to like it , according to what I've read on the Internet. Somewhere I remember it was clearly written: "only couples and mixed groups admitted". I guess it was a nudist camp in Spain.
   The keeper is a nice girl in her 30s, tanned and with long smooth dark hair: I ask her if there is a vacant site for my tent. Yes, there is. I give her my INF card and she askes me if I am alone. Yes, I am alone. It's Ok! I give her my identity card and she gives me a booklet and a map of the camp. Tomorrow morning I'll have to come back here to tell her the number of the site where I've set up my tent. That's all. I can go in!
   I get on my car and the white bar moves up. I am inside the camp! I would be beaming with joy if I was not so tired and sweaty. My only thought is find a good site, get out of this 4wheeled sauna and set up my tent. The asphalt street leads to a two-floor building that, according to the map, should be the Reception. I see some people walking on the border of the street: they are all clothed! Other people are riding bikes: they are fully clothed too! I stop my car and look at the driving mirror. I think of me going back to the entrance and checking if I entered into the right camp. Then I think that maybe there is a textile area. I read again my map and all the papers the lady gave me but I find nothing about it. I feel confused and I am very tired because I've been driving since early morning. I decide to go on.
   I turn into a narrow asphalt street still looking for a good place to set up my tent. Going through motorhomes and caravans I see now and then few naked people. Maybe I was too worried about the clothed ones. I drive around the camp not knowing where to stop myself: the sites are all numbered and are often covered with gravel. They seem to be more suited for caravans than tents. I would like to sleep on ground or grass, not stones. I am also worried about the lack of shadow: the trees are little except in two places where there are old tall ones. Of course all shaded sites are taken but, though it is mid-August, the camp is not full.
   I stop on a site right behind the bungalows zone and I park my car beside an olive tree. Near me there is an italian caravan: that is fine because most of the cars I've seen so far are german. The Sun sets while I set up my tent. I do not undress because I am not at ease being surrounded by so many clothed people. I am not sure that it is really a nudist camp. I think: it is 7 pm, it is very hot, even for me that I like hot weather, so why are all those people fully clothed? It is strange...
   Still wearing t-shirt and shorts I go to the restaurant called Pizza, placed just behind the Reception. It looks like a german one: long dark wooden tables with long wooden benches. It remembers me of a beerhouse in Munchen! The tables are outside the building, under a high bower of green cloth. A lot of people are eating: everyone wears t-shirt and trousers, a few females wear a skirt. It looks like a common textile resort at dinner time. I feel tired and disappointed. I order a Pizza Margherita and a salad. People around me are chatting but I don't understand German language. That's a shame because I cannot hear what they are talking about... and I have no-one to talk to.
   I eat my pizza then I go inside the restaurant building: I've seen someone coming out with ice-cream and I want to eat one cone. While I wait to be served, two naked boys around 10 years old come at the counter and ask for a drink. I think that maybe we could all stay naked here!
   With the ice-cream cone in my hand, I walk along the asphalt street that leads to the Grill restaurant. In front of it there is a cross. On the left and straight on there are narrow gravel streets, the asphalt one turns right and soon I see two big pots that stop the cars from going on. On the left side of the street the is a grass with little trees, a wall and stairs to go down to the pebble beach. On the right side there is a grass with trees and then the Lauri bungalows. The grass by the sea is full of people tonight. There are some cooks around a great roasting-jack, there's a lot of beer and wine on the tables. It looks like a common textile party: people drink, eat, dance... I feel bored so I come back to my tent where I can at last take off my clothes. I don't know it, but I am missing Valalta's Carnival. Well, one would expect Carnival in Febraury and not in August so I go to sleep and don't see the masks and the body paintings.

The sunlight wakes me up at seven. I am relaxed and ready for a new day. I go out of my tent. I am naked of course! The morning air is fresh but not cold as I expected so I feel very good being nude. I really fear the cold, so I guess there must be at least 22 or 23 Centigrade degrees. I take a towel, my toilet bag with me and I go to the toilet building. Along the way I see a man doing footing: he's completely clothed; then I see two men biking: they are wearing clothes for bikers: shirt and tight trousers. Uhmm... that is strange! The toilet building looks a little like an underground station. It is not easy to find the way to the toilet room and to the sinks and showers room. Finally I find them turning around a wall that seems to lead nowhere. I am disappointed because the showers work with a disc, but there is not sign that says where I can go to buy it! I wash myself at the sinks. There is no problem because I am already naked...
Valalta    The hall is deserted. After a while a man comes in: he's wearing t-shit and shorts. Then arrives a kid: he's wearing pijamas. All at once I think that this is not a nudist camp and that maybe I am an exhibitionist! Another man enters: he has pants on so I think that I should rush and go out. I am nearly ready to go when I see an old woman, who is wearing a bath-robe, that undress in the shower box and then goes nude to the toilet hall. I laugh: maybe this is really a nudist camp!
    I go to my tent, take my shoulder-purse and go to the supermarket to buy milk and brioches. Unfortunately I did not dress up. At the entrance of the supermarket there is a sign with a red cross that shows a naked girl and then a sign of a girl with t-shirt and shorts. There is also a sing that shows a girl wearing an olympic costume: there is a red cross on it. What the hell! I go back to my tent and put on the same clothes of yesterday. How do I feel? Uncomfortably hot! It's 8 o'clock, the sky is clear, the sun is already hot, and I wonder how can all those people walk through the camp with clothes on. Inside the supermarket there is air-conditioning but it is not cold, it is just warm. Anyway I look around me and see that someone arrives naked and put a towel around its waist just before going into the supermarket and remove it just outside the door. Tomorrow I will do the same.
   I find good chocolate-milk and brioches with jam. I have beakfast sitting in front of my tent under the shadow of the olive tree, then I wear cap, sunglasses, I spread some protective cream on my skin and I go exploring Valalta. The coast is around 4Km long, that should be around 2 miles and 1/2. At one end of it there is a naturist harbour named Marina! The coast is nearly deserted: I see few old people sitting on the rocks or swimming in the sea. On the paths between motorhomes and caravans I see some people walking with underwears and shorts on. I guess they are going to the toilets. I glimpse at the caravans and I see people having breakfast with drinks, cheese, ham and many other things. Is that a german breakafast? Only around 11 am the coast becomes crowded a little.
   At 12 all the people of the camp are swimming and tanning by the sea or by the swimmingpool. Some kids are playing on the water-slide, that is placed on one side of the Blue Flag gulf, and some are playing with sand in a little fenced place. Istria has only rocky shores. The coast of Valalta have been caved with powders to create even surfaces where people can lay their towels to subathe by the sea, while at the center of the gulfs have been brought artificial gravel. You need good sandals to walk around there. I have wooden sandals that are ok for walking on the coast and on the paths, but I miss the plastic shoes that would be useful when I have to walk on the pebble to go swimming. I also have a tender mat to put under my towel.
   The sea water is warm so I have a nice long bathe. Around 1 pm the sun is very strong but no-one seems to look for some shadow. I know that the worst time to expose oneself to the sun is between 1 and 4 pm. Maybe all these naturists don't know anything about it or take no care of what medicians say. In fact they don't even use protective creams: untill now I've seen so many red butts and breasts that I am amazed. It clearly shows that around the half of the people around me have been to textile beaches before coming here, so few persons show white butts and breasts and a great number shows breasts and butts as red as a beetroot!
   I love the shadow and I feel hungry too! I dry up and I go to the Pizza to eat spaghetti and salad. Some people at the restaurant are naked but many males wear shorts and most women have a cloth wrapper around their trunk or their waist. I read again the booklet I was given at the entrance of the camp yesterday. There is written: "Bathing costumes are not allowed. We ask you to wear other kind of clothes if you want to be served by our employees". Under the patio of the restaurant there is a big white sign that shows it clearly with some drawings, the same I saw at the entrance of the supermarket: a naked woman, a woman wearing an olympic costume with a red cross on her, a woman wearing shorts and t-shirt, a bicicle with a red cross on it, a skateboard has a red cross, too, and finally rollerskate have a red cross on them. Well, it looks funny! We are in a nudist camp, nudity should be allowed everywhere and those that for some reason want to cover should put up whatever they want. Unfortunately nakedness is not allowed in the supermarket, at the reception, at the shops and inside some of the restaurants.
   After lunch I look for a shadowy place where I can have a rest. My tent is under the sun since early morning and it is impossible to sleep into it. After some searching, I find a long shadowy zone by the pebble shore of the Blue Flag gulf. I lay down on my towel and sleep for a while. A lot of people keep playing under the sun.

III

I get up around 4 pm and walk to the little gulf by the Grill. There I have another long relaxing swim. There is a cement wharf that kids and teens use like a trampolin. They laudly jump into the sea and bring some joy to the camp that sometimes is far too quiet. I dry up and walk around there. By the Spaccio there are two volleyball ground with sand! People are playing games. At 7 I come back to my tent, I open all the zips and let the wind blow inside. It cools the air but, when I enter, the straw-mat under my feet is still very hot and so it is my chair, the basin of my tent and my sleeping-bag. I take a clean hot towel and go to the toilet building to shower. Then I cook my dinner while the sun hides behind the bungalows and the shadow come over me and my tent. I take a jar of peaches in syrup out of my car and open it. The heat cooked them! They would be perfect on a cake.
   The sun has set and I am still naked! I took of my clothes yesterday night so, if I do not count the few minutes I had to wear something at the supermarket, I've been completely nude for 22 hours. It's fantastic! I've always wanted to do it. I decide that I will dress up only when I feel cold. I wash my pots and cutlery (I use plastic dishes), I put them and the camp-stove inside my tent, I spray some repellent for mosquitos on my body and I am ready for tonight! Naked? Of course I am still naked.
   The camp is dark because street-lamps are only on the main road: it start at the entrance, passes by the Reception and ends at the Grill. I put some money and an electric light in my little handbag and go for a walk. I stop at the Pizza to buy an ice-cream. Everybody is dressed like yesterday night, I am the only naked one here. I arrive in front of the Grill and turn right to walk on the street that I call "the sea-front". The street is dark but it is brightned a little by the lights of the Grill and the Spaccio restaurants, the last one is placed by the Marina harbour. I go straight to the Marina's wharves. The main wharf has tall neon lamps and it is made of cement, the other ones are made of wood. I like to walk there. When I was a teen I've always thought about a nude walk at night on a lighted harbour. But this place is not like in my dreams: everybody is dressed here. I do not mean they are wearing pants or a t-shirt to warm up, I mean they are fully clothed! They are wearing jeans, shirts, shoes, pants, vests; women are wearing skirts, blouses, bras; a group of teenagers are dressed with long trousers, big sport shoes, t-shirt with sleeves long to their elbows and a jaket tied up on their waist. I cannot believe my eyes! I really don't stand the cold, so if I am walking naked it means that it is an hot night. Now, most people around me are German, that means they must be more accustomed to the cold than me and less accustomed to the hot, so how can it be that I am naked and they are fully clothed? Honestly, their sight makes me sweating!
   All at once I feel like if I was out of place. People seem to look at me in a bad way, like if I was trying to focus their attention on me because I am naked. This camp looks very different after the Sun has set. Like yesterday night, like this morning, I am not sure that this is a nudist camp. I'm wondering I did not read carefully the booklet, maybe there is a rule that forbid nudity at night. I recall that I've read somewhere that there are nudist resorts where nudism is banned after 8pm. Is that one of them? Am I infringing the habit of this camp? Here everyone is dressed. I feel strange. I don't feel safe being naked. I think that maybe I should have taken with me a jaket or a pair of shorts. But it is not cold at all, they would be useless. I think that maybe I should go to my tent, put t-shirt and trousers on to look like all the others. I've never felt like that before. I try to think that this must be a nudist resort, that it is my right to walk around naked also at night. But nobody here is naked. How can it be?
   With these thoughts I leave the sea-front and I walk through the motorhomes and caravans, on the dark and narrow streets. I turn on my electric lamp to see the ground and do not stumble over the gravel. I reach the path that runs along the coast and I calm down. Dim lights coming from the verandas of the caravans shows people playing cards or watching TV. Many caravans are without wheels and have nice hedges and flowers all around. Now and then I see some old naked people. If they are naked then this is a nudist camp. I skirt the Blue Flag gulf earing the nice sound of the waves on the rocks, watching the stars in the sky. The air is fresher and humid. I think that a t-shirt would be useful now, but after few minutes I do not feel cold anymore. I keep on walking.
   I go up on the stairs and reach the Uvala restaurant where a crowd of clothed people are eating, then I walk on an asphalted street that leads to the Reception. I've had enough for today so I go to my tent, take my toilet bag and go washing my teeth. Of course I find clothed people at the toilet building, except a pair of old men that arrives naked while I am leaving.

Thanks to the incredibly hot weather I've been always naked for the next five days of my stay. I did not wear any dress for 156 hours, but I did not force myself to do that.
   The second day of my stay has been very similar to the first one, and so the following days. I had no adventures, I simply had a lot of walks through the camp and along the coast, I relaxed, I swam and observed the people around me.
   I looked for people around my age, a late teen or twentysomething. There were some but not as many as I expected. Most were young couples with no children who spent their time on their own. Instead there were many young ones under 15. One day I saw a little group of late teens. They were behind a bush. The guys had simming trunks on, long to their knees, the girls were topless but had a towel wrapped around their waist. They were there, chatting behind that bush. I've never seen them with their families, they were always on their own also at night. I've never seen them in the morning, too.
Valalta    One afternoon I was sleeping on the pebble beach. When I woke up I saw them sitting near me. There were two girls: one was nude, the other one had a towel around her waist. There two boys, too, wearing trunks long to their knees as I said. After a while came two other girls and another boy. The girls had a towel around their waist and the boy the long swimming trunks. They sat beside the group of four. Soon the only girl that was naked covered herself with the towel she used for sitting. They chatted and after a while the group of three went away. The girl that once was nude did not take her towel off from her waist. Then, one hour later they set from the beach.
   I thought that the girls were nude under their towels but I was wrong. The next afternoon they all were by the water slide and were going to swim. The four girls removed their towels and showed bright coloured bathing costumes that look like tight pants for cyclists. These costumes where long from belly button to half thigh. I noticed that in the camp there were few other women who wore that strange costume. I saw no-one wearing tanga or bikini bottom. All the women I saw in the week of my stay were topless.
   For women it was common to walk through the camp sites with a towel around their waist or a peek-a-boo cloth. On the other hand, nearly all men used to walk naked everywhere it was allowed. At first I thought that maybe all these women were not completely at ease with nudity, or maybe they were too self conscious. Or maybe they were afraid to meet a man who could stare at their bodies. Then I thought about what happens at night and I guessed that maybe it was the femal need of adorning, to show that they own things and look more interesting and misterious.
   Here's an episode to think about this: one evening I was dining at the Grill. I was tired to cook alone for myself at my tent so I went to this open-air restaurant. It was 7pm, most people sitting around me were naked. It was hot as usual and the sun rays were hitting the tables. We had no shelter from the bower because the sun was going to set. I was eating when I saw a family walking through the tables. I saw a mum and dad with a teen daughter and a kid: they were all naked and barefoot. They went to read the menu at the desk then went away. After ten minutes they came back: dad and son were still completely naked, mum and daughter had a veil, painted with a flower drawing, wrapped around their trunks. What was the need of that cloth? It was warm, nudity was allowed at the Grill so why did they dress up? Maybe they wanted to draw attention upon them? It was not the only family of naked males and dressed females, anyway...
   I had my (nude) walks on the Marina every night of my stay. I did not care about what happened the first night, it is a nudist camp and I am a nudist so I go around naked... if I don't feel cold. All people around me were clothed as I said, but it was their business. Valalta camp don't have an open place where people can meet at night. Sure, there are six restaurants and some of them have music two or three times a week in August, but there is no square or a sea-front with lamps and sits where people can gather. After the sun sets the restaurants were crowded untill midnight but I only saw smart fully dressed people inside. It wasn't nudist at all! As I said, those who wanted to stay nude at night, I saw few little kids and old men walking through the camp, remained at their bungalows or caravans or motorhomes or tents.

   Valalta is the first nudist camp I visited in my life and I left it thoughtful. I don't want to label people and say who are nudists or naturists and who are not, but if nudists feel good without clothes why should they wear them when there is a chance to be nude? On 4000 people, why 99% of them wore clothes right after the sun had set and the air was warm through all night? Are these people that love to live without clothes or just people that don't wear bathing costumes? My impression was that 99% was just people that do not use costumes. I don't mean that they all should be nude 24 hours a day, but I expected that at least 30% or maybe 50% would be nude at night... if it is a warm night.
   I would like to visit more nudist camps around Europe to find the one that suits my tastes, a camp where I don't need to dress to go to the supermarket, to the restaurants, to the reception or to make a phone call, a camp where nudity is not just a day thing. In Istria there are Ulika, Monsena, Polaris and more nudist camps on Cres and Krk islands. Around the world there are 800 nudist resorts... somewhere there is the one good for me.

5th December 2000

[Essay]

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