The National Trust, in the UK, is an organisation dedicated to preserving the cultural heritage of a particular geographic region.

It does marvellous work. Preserving old houses, woodland, forest, beach… I’m a proud member of the NT.

It also owns Studland, a beach in Dorset, England, which has long been a naturist beach.

Usually, you might expect an ‘establishment’ type of organisation to have an issue with naturism. Not so. Naturism lives very comfortably with the National Trust.

Just a few ‘warning’ or, more accurately, ‘advisory’ signs exist.

It’s an example of how official bodies could react to naturism, and it’s a pleasure to see the NT take such an enlightened approach to an alternative lifestyle. It’s also a pleasure to see naturism take such a responsible action towards the facilities granted them. ‘Beach clean up days’ are organised by naturists, to ensure the cleanliness of the facility for all, and naturists also took a pro-active approach to weeding out those involved or indulging in ‘dogging’, under the disguise of naturism, at Studland, and patrolling the dunes to ensure nothing that isn’t ‘family-values’ naturism was allowed to hold sway.

Wouldn’t it be nice if your town council, local beach trust or whoever marshals local beaches did the same? We don’t demand the world. We respectfully request a small area where we, or a naturist persuasion, may practice our chosen lifestyle without harassment or fear.

Trine

I think that many of us were probably concerned when Fab Free was undergoing some changes last year that the closure of their freebie point would also impact on their regular cart sales at Fab Free HQ, The Wash.

Happily, this has turned out not to be the case, and a ‘Spring Freshness’ event is ongoing until the end of the month.

There’s lots of nice, affordable, classy looking bits of clothing, furniture, poses, etc all to be picked up for L$10, but much of it won’t distract us from a naturist perspective (unless we’re still filling that suitcase for our naturist holiday evening wear). One thing that did catch my eye, though, were these wellington boots, possibly only because I’ve been in a naturist setting wearing nothing but wellington boots this week.

There are, in naturist circles, what are known as landed clubs, that is clubs that own and maintain their own grounds, their own land. We (partner and myself) are lucky enough to be members of such a club in the north of England, and many of us have given time to get the club looking fantastic in advance of our usual official opening at Easter each year (we actually open, for the season, next Thursday).

It has been a wet winter here in England, with lots of flooding near where we are and further north into Cumbria. Domestically, we weren’t affected, but the club did take a little bit of a battering. Nothing overly flooded, but the ground underfoot was very, very soft and muddy as a result of the winter rains. Happily, a pretty good week last week allowed us to get out and get a lot of small maintenance jobs going,  painting the clubhouse, mowing lawns, weeding and so on, and the weather (I started two days last week fully dressed and was nude, apart from wellington boots, by mid-afternoon).

Trine helps mend a fence at her club

My Facebook page (a personal one, not a SL related one) is already filled with news of clubs across Europe putting the final touches to their spruced-up locations, so we’ve not been alone in the naturist community in undertaking similar tasks.

The summer always seems that little bit closer whenever the clubs open, and it promises to be an excellent European naturist season. If you haven’t tried naturism yet, maybe you should make 2016 your year to participate. Good friends, good conversation, good (fresh, home grown) food in many instances, and a tremendous sense of well-being that naturism provides.

Trine