I am an owner of a small naturist resort in Greece, My wife and I have been running the resort now for nearly 15 years and one thing we hear from people in conversation, from reading blogs and magazine articles is the need to encourage more people to try naturism.

Now don’t get me wrong the more people who try naturism, the more potential new customers for our resort, so my business head says that all the work the federation’s and it’s members along with the magazine editors do to promote naturism is well worth it and is just what we need to improve the naturist movement.

Now myself I don’t necessarily agree with this idea. It is a selfish reason and that’s the people. I am a lover of peaceful and tranquil environments where I can relax read my book and enjoy the natural sounds of my surroundings. Naturism is quoted to be “a way of life in harmony with nature” 

So where am I going with this, well many people together in my opinion do not create this quiet and relaxing environment, my personal choice is to visit beaches to enjoy my naturist time. I love the beach and I can think of nothing better than finding a small sandy bay to myself and stripping off and spending the day reading, swimming and enjoying the warm sun.

Mounda

I am very lucky I spend my summers on a small Greek island which is surrounded by beaches, bays, coves and crystal clear turquoise warm water. My local naturist beach is only 10 minutes away from where I live and is at the far end of a busy beach full of tourists and locals. 

Its a beautiful beach and on many occasions I enjoy the beach bar and tavernas that are situated there, but do I want to join the hundreds of people laying on sun-loungers with music coming from the beach bar for the day in my swim suit? NO WAY!

So I walk the 5 minutes that’s needed along the beach and I find this – an empty beach with a few fellow naturists quietly enjoying the beach. So if we encourage more people to become naturists won’t our secluded beaches soon become covered in sun-chairs, have music blaring out from a beach bar and hundreds of noisy naked people?

I think naturism is best kept to ourselves!    

This blog is part of an blog from Nick and Lins at Naked Wanderings titled “Can naturist resorts be successful while maintaining its values” 

They have some interesting ideas about keeping youngsters involved in naturism and at the bottom of the article is part of a comment from Simon T and his experience at Vassaliki with his young daughter. 

Will creating a safe environment and a decent online marketing strategy bring more youth? It will certainly help but again it’s not the one and only key to success. Teenagers and early twenty-somethings are the most difficult group to attract to naturism.

Then how did Bare Oaks manage to attract them?

We couldn’t find the answer. During one of our late night discussions about the topic which again seemed to lead nowhere we decided that we would have ask them.

Who can we ask?

Well… there are the three nice girls at the reception, how young were they? 21, 22?

Oh and there’s that girl who drives around picking up the garbage!

Oh and the guy who’s delivering the firewood!

Oh and oooooooooooooh.

The answer was brilliant in its simplicity. If you want more youth in your naturist resort, you give them a job.

The fact that teenagers turn away from naturism is something we can barely avoid. Not only is puberty a very confusing phase in life, it’s also the time when kids want to start building their personality. A personality which they often prefer to be different than the one of their parents.

The big question is how to get them back into naturism after this phase. Some of the kids who were raised at Bare Oaks got away from naturism and some didn’t. That’s how it goes, but several who went their own way decided to come back. Instead of just having to hang around all summer they could actually earn some money while being reunited with their old friends.

Generations attract those of the same generation. The more you can keep, the more others will return and eventually, the word will spread and there will be more newcomers as well.

Giving youth a job is a great way to keep them in the resort but a more important factor is to listen to them as well. Stop thinking that you know what young people want. We, although only in our thirties, often have no clue about how the younger generation thinks. When you have them available right there at your reception desk, talk to them. Give them responsibilities. Have them involved when choices have to be made. Ask them how they would make the place more attractive. Ask them to help organising new events. Ask their opinion.

It’s an easy thing to say that youth is not interested in naturism anymore or that they lost believe in the traditional values and naturist ethics. During the “volleyball weekend” at Bare Oaks we saw the opposite. There was plenty of youth who had all come down to play volleyball, enjoy themselves at the waterpark that was taken over for the occasion or just to meet old and new friends.

Attracting more new and younger members doesn’t go from one day on the other. An online appearance, a marketing strategy, modern technologies and a young influence, it all takes time and effort. But it works.

Simon T

I took my family to Vassiliki in Kefalonia this summer and my despite the resort not really catering for children specifically the owners solution was to give her a staff polo-neck top and put her to work! Back at home she said it was the best holiday ever! So maybe too little trust and responsibility is another reason as to why the younger generations and families continue to only trickle in to venues.

You can read the whole article at https://www.nakedwanderings.com/2018/09/06/can-naturist-resort-be-successful-while-maintaining-its-values/

Samantha and I want to thank all of you who have called, emailed or messaged us asking about our welfare.  We feel very loved by our amazing guests and suppliers at Vassaliki. 

We are both still in the UK. We decided we wanted to be close to our families during this difficult time for all. 

We of course have no idea when or if we will be able to open Vassaliki this coming summer. We are waiting to see what happens and in the meantime are staying safe by isolating at home.

We are already packed with all the equipment we take with us each year for the resort and are ready to instantly leave for the long drive and ferry trip to Kefalonia, as soon as we are allowed to leave. 

We will then need approximately two weeks to get the resort cleaned up and ready for whatever season remains (depending what surprises the winter may have left us.)

All our staff and suppliers in Kefalonia are safe, but at the time of writing this, they are on complete lockdown with very limited movement allowed. They must obtain permission from the authorities to leave their houses! We have been in contact with all our team and they report that they are well but struggling with the strict rules placed on them.

So what about your holiday? I am sure we will all need a bit of Kefalonian sun and Vassaliki magic after all this!

As soon as we are open we will let you know and will keep you updated on our progress. Anyone who cannot take their holiday with us this summer, either because we are still locked down or you feel uncomfortable to travel this year, we will move your booking and deposit to next year for you. 

When you are notified by the airline that your flight has been cancelled, then please get in touch with us.  

In the meantime, please stay safe and keep on dreaming. It won’t be long before we are back in the Greek sun with a cold glass of Mythos Beer!

We all know now we have a major issue on our planet with single use plastics. We have become so dependent on them that we now seem to be unable to exist without them.

We are producing over 300 million tons of plastic every year, 50% of which is for single-use purposes – More than 8 million tons of plastic is dumped into our oceans every year.

So who is to blame? Who needs to sort this out? Well it’s clear every single one of us needs to step up to the mark and make some very fast changes to how we live.

So what are we doing to make the change? Vassaliki is constantly looking for and implementing ways to reduce waste produced on resort.

This year all our rooms have had recycling bins installed – this allows us to separate and recycle glass, cans, plastic bottles and cardboard/ paper. All this waste is collected by us and taken to the local recycle bins.

Our pool bar and restaurant have been recycling glass, plastic bottles and cardboard/ paper now for several years. We also now have a strict no plastic straw policy and we don’t automatically offer straws with all our drinks. Plus we don’t plastic decorations to our cocktails.

Our biggest plastic waste issue has been the water bottles – We have been working now for a few years to reduce the number of bottles we dispose of each year. The last two years we have been offering guests the opportunity to refill reusable Vassaliki water bottles at one of our cold water stations situated on resort for a small fee. This has proven very popular and has made a huge reduction to our plastic bottle waste. Our drinking water is delivered in 20 litre water barrels and attached to a cooling machine. The barrel when empty is then returned to the water company to be refilled. 

Our next stage to get rid of plastic bottles is to install a larger water filter and cooling system at the bar area. This we hope will allow guests to either fill their own reusable water bottles or one of our Vassaliki bottles. We will then serve chilled filtered water in reusable water bottles to the tables at meal times. With all our other drinks being sold in recyclable cans and glass bottles we hope to be free of single use plastic bottles by 2021.

So what other changes do we have in the pipeline? Well unfortunately we are fazing out our complementary shower gel, shampoo and body lotion bottles, but we are looking into replacing them with a refillable shower gel bottle in the shower and we already have hand soap in refillable pump bottles.

We are also stopping supplying washing up sponge and scourers in each room from 2020 but the washable dish cloth, tea towel and oven gloves will remain on offer in your room on arrival. 

The other issue to tackle is the bin bags in the bathrooms as we are unable to allow paper down the toilets, so we are now investigating into biodegradable bags.

We are starting to do our bit and are always looking for further ways to reduce our waste. So if you can think of anything else we can look into please let us know we are very keen to improve on reducing our waste.

It’s time to book your holiday!  Samantha is working hard now taking bookings for summer 2020.

The resort will open on 16th May 2020 and we still have a few rooms available for this beautiful time of year. The flora is amazing around the island and the beaches are still quiet and peaceful.

As always June is one of our most popular months with 80% of our rooms now sold, so we have very little availability left:

• 2nd – 11th June in a One Bedroom Apartment
• 8th – 18th June in a One Bedroom Apartment
• 14th – 30th June in a One Bedroom Apartment
• 20th June to 7th July in a Roof Studio (JUST SOLD SORRY)

July and August are selling well with 65% of our rooms during this period already sold. We still have plenty of gaps, so give Samantha a call or have a look online.

September is once again very busy with 85% of the rooms booked up well in advance. We have just one gap to fill:

• 15th – 22nd September in our Maisonette 

We also have availability in One Bedroom Apartments and Roof Studios from 23rd September onwards until we close the resort on 6th October.

While writing this article Samantha has taken a further three bookings, so if you are planning a stay with us, please book as soon as possible as we hate having to turn you away.

(All bookings must be 7 or more nights – we will launch shorter 3 and 4 day stays in May subject to availability.)

We get asked all the time how Brexit is going to affect our business in Greece. We have not really looked into it much as it seemed to us like Brexit was never going to happen and the information we were finding was not confirmed, confusing or incorrect most of the time. Now with the election all done, it looks like we may finally, after several failed attempts, leave the EU.

So what do we know for summer 2020? Well not much! But what we do know is that you will be able to travel as we have been since we joined the EU. Nothing will change except you may need to make sure you comply to the new rules below:

New rules will apply for travel to Europe if/when the UK leaves the EU without a deal on January 31st 2020

You should have at least 6 months left on an adult or child passport to travel to most countries in Europe (not including Ireland).

If you renewed your current passport before the previous one expired, extra months may have been added to its expiry date. Any extra months on your passport over 10 years may not count towards the 6 months needed.

Implementation period

The Withdrawal Agreement sets out an implementation period lasting until 31 December 2020. This is a time-limited period before Brexit-related changes take place.

During the implementation period, your rights and those of your family members will not change. The rules on travelling to the EU will remain the same during this period. You can travel to a different country in the EU in the same way as you can now. More information is available on this link https://www.gov.uk/guidance/passport-rules-for-travel-to-europe-after-brexit

So now what? I think book your flights, book your room at Vassaliki and lets spend the summer relaxing naked in Kefalonia and let the government sort the rest out!