Nudist Day visited Playa Chihuahua in Uruguay during four consecutive days. Chihuahua, now legally nude for about ten years, is unlike so many other nudist beaches in the world, as you can drive right up to it: No rocks to climb! What greets you is a wide strand of white sand, perhaps a kilometer long (.6 mile). The beach is located about 20 kilometers (12 miles) north of Punta del Este, in the direction of Montevideo. The airport is nearby, a fact that is easily noticed by the jet planes screeching overhead.
The water here can seem a little brackish in color, but we were assured that it wasn’t contamination from the coffee-brown “Plate” river that feeds this part of the South Atlantic. Said water was rather cool despite it being summer here (December through March), but this was actually a welcome relief from the intense 90 degree heat typical of this time of the year. They were a few fair-sized jellies floating around, so one had to be careful not to get stung. If you enjoy body surfing, there is normally a lot of wave action here, but do mind the rip currents that can suddenly appear. At the far end of the beach there’s a lagoon populated with large numbers of crabs.
Chihuahua beach has a little snack bar and lifeguard station, but the toilets are strictly of the port-a-potty kind. The snack bar, besides dispensing pricey food and drinks, also loans out beach umbrellas and folding chairs, though you could buy them from a local supermarket for not much more than it costs to rent. The beach is amazingly clean, as clean-up crews scour the beach every morning. Beach goers were well-behaved, and we weren’t bothered by the usual perverts that typically haunt public nude beaches. Most of the beach population consisted of gay couples, people whom we’ve generally found to be very respectful of others.
The beach regulations, posted on one side of the snack bar, stipulate that nudity is obligatory inside the limits of the nude zone, but textiles were more numerous than nudes in the nude area. However, nudes were also dispersed far beyond the nude limits. People appeared to be oblivious to this, whether textile or nudist, and there’s no enforcement of the rules.
On the negative side, we were informed by reliable sources that sexual activity, some of it procured by male prostitutes, occurs with frequency in the sand dunes and pine woods behind the beach. We didn’t actually see any of this, but we did notice the constant presence of men standing in the dunes.
As mentioned earlier, access to the beach is simple if you have a vehicle. If you don’t and you’re not lodged in one of the few hotels near the beach, there’s frequent bus service from either Punta del Este or Maldonado. Your best bet is the COT (Cotsa) bus number 1, which will drop you off and pick you up at the “Tio Tom” stop, a 30 minute ride to/from the Punta del Este bus station. From Tio Tom, find your way to the coast and walk north along the beach, about 3 kilometers (2 miles) total.
For accommodations, your best bet is the naturist bed and breakfast “La Posada Chihuahua”, a charming inn just a short walk from the beach, or Tio Tom, a not so nice textile motel right on the textile beach. We cannot recommend “El Refugio”, another nudist bed and breakfast in the area, due to the many complaints we’ve heard, not to mention the owner’s hostile reception when we tried to contact him for an interview.
Overall, as nude beaches go, Chihuahua gets a high grade from this publication. There exists one other official nudist beach in Uruguay, this one in the Rocha region, which offers no services and is harder to access.
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Tags: beach, south america, uruguay
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[...] Paradise Found at Chihuahua Beach [...]
[...] Paradise Found at Chihuahua Beach [...]