A nakation is a naked vacation, and the word, coined by the American Association for Nude Recreation and registered as a service mark in 2008, now covers everything from a week at a Florida resort to an eleven-night charter of a cruise ship. Nude cruises are the fastest-growing part of it: a charter company rents an entire ship, sets its own rules, and for a week or more the pool deck is clothing-optional from the moment the ship leaves the pier.
How a nude cruise works
No cruise line runs nude sailings itself. A charter company such as Bare Necessities Tour and Travel of Austin, Texas, or Bliss Cruise books an entire ship for a specific sailing, sells the cabins through its own site and travel agents, and writes the rules the cruise line's crew enforce. Because the whole ship is chartered, there are no textile passengers aboard, which is what makes a nude cruise work. Booking opens a year or more ahead, a deposit holds a cabin, and the inside and ocean-view cabins sell out first. Fares on the big charters start around $2,000 per person for an interior cabin on an eleven-night sailing and run past $30,000 for the top suites.
The Big Nude Boat
Bare Necessities has run naturist charters since 1990 and its Big Nude Boat is the largest nude cruise in the world. The February 2026 sailing was on Norwegian Pearl out of Miami, February 9 to 20, with calls at Great Stirrup Cay, Ocho Rios, Aruba, Curaçao and Bonaire. The next sails from Miami on Norwegian Jewel from February 15 to 26, 2027: eleven nights through the Eastern Caribbean with stops including Great Stirrup Cay in the Bahamas, Puerto Rico, the British Virgin Islands, St. Kitts, Antigua and the Dominican Republic, fares from about $2,000 per person double occupancy. The crowd is naturist in the plain sense: couples, singles and groups from clubs across North America, average age well over fifty, with AANR and The Naturist Society both aboard.
Bliss Cruise
Bliss Cruise describes itself as America's largest adults-only, full-ship clothing-optional charter company. Its sailings are shorter and more frequent, typically four to seven nights out of Fort Lauderdale on Royal Caribbean and Celebrity ships, with several departures a year: in 2026 a four-night Bahamas sailing on Radiance of the Seas in late February, a Celebrity Silhouette sailing in April and a November Caribbean week. The pool decks are clothing-optional at sea. Bliss is a couples-oriented lifestyle charter rather than a naturist one, and its atmosphere is closer to a clothing-optional resort with a party calendar than to the Big Nude Boat; read our guide to the three kinds of resort before choosing between them, because the difference matters more on a ship you cannot leave.
Dress rules at sea
- At sea or at anchor: open decks, pools and designated areas are clothing-optional, and on the Big Nude Boat most people are nude from breakfast on the first sea day.
- In port: clothing is required from the moment the ship ties up until it sails, on the open decks included. Port authorities insist on it, and the charter will enforce it.
- Dining rooms: casual attire is required in the sit-down restaurants; the buffet is usually clothing-optional with a cover-up requested at the serving line.
- Towels: you sit on a towel everywhere, on every chair, at all times, nude or in a thong.
- Age: 21 and over on the charters named above. There are no children on a nude cruise.
- Cameras: no photography of anyone without consent; many charters restrict cameras on deck altogether and will confiscate them.
Everything in the nude beach etiquette guide applies, with the difference that your neighbors are the same two thousand people for eleven days.
Naturist holidays on land
If a ship is not your idea of a vacation, the land-based nakation is older and often cheaper.
- Vera Playa, Spain. Almería's naturist zone has about two kilometers of beach reserved for naturists and a cluster of naturist apartment complexes, Natsun and Vera Natura among them, that let you live nude for a week with the supermarket a short walk away. It is the easiest self-catering nakation in Europe. Browse Spain.
- Cap d'Agde, France. The Village Naturiste rents apartments by the week, and the family campsite and the quieter ends of the two kilometer beach are where naturists stay; the village's swinger quarter is a separate scene, so choose your building. Browse France, and read our European beach guide for the beaches around both.
- Hidden Beach Resort, Mexico. The Au Naturel Club at Kantenah, on the Riviera Maya about an hour south of Cancún airport, is an adults-only all-inclusive of around forty suites where clothing is optional throughout, beach, pool and restaurant included. Guests can use the pools and spa of the larger textile resort next door, dressed. It is the easiest all-inclusive nakation from the United States. Browse Mexico.
- US resorts. Cypress Cove and Lake Como in Florida, Laguna del Sol in California and Oaklake Trails in Oklahoma all rent rooms, cabins and sites by the week; the resort directory has the rest, and our first resort visit guide covers the arrival.
Booking a nakation
- Decide naturist or lifestyle first. The two travel in different directions and the brochures look the same.
- Book early. Charters sell out a year ahead; European naturist centers book out July and August by spring.
- Check the membership requirement. Many European sites and some charters want a naturist federation card or an AANR or TNS membership, or sell a temporary one.
- Pack light. A nakation needs fewer clothes than any other holiday, but it needs more towels, more sunscreen and one outfit for port days and the dining room.
- Ask people who went. The forum has trip reports from every Big Nude Boat since the first one, and members list the resorts and cruises they have taken on their profiles; the events calendar lists group bookings on the next sailings.