Date Published: 05/04/2022
ARCHIVED - All beaches in Cadiz, Spain to be turned into nudist beaches
The popular tourist city in Andalucía has divided opinions over a new law allowing naturism on every beach in the city
The City Council in Cádiz has decided to make a change to the law governing all the beaches in the municipality, and allow nudism on every single one of them.
There were already nudist beaches and nudist areas in Cádiz, which is a popular holiday destination for many in the south of Spain, but before this most of the beaches were not specifically for naturists. Traditionally, the stretch that ran along the Ventorrillo del Chato and Torregorda areas of the Cortadura beach was the bathing area reserved for naturism, although it was still technically illegal as there were no official signs up to say it was a nudist area.
With this new measure, though, the Cádiz City Council will declare this stretch of coast as a nudist beach with the necessary indications, and the aim is to allow nudism on every inch of the city’s coastline.
Ismael Rodrigo, president of the Spanish Naturist Federation, expressed his satisfaction with the new ordinance, saying that his organisation has been demanding this step for 13 years based on the argument that the old law was, paradoxically, “illegal”: “Nudism is recognised as freedom of expression by the European Court of Human Rights.”
However, Ester Carnero, president of the Cádiz Association of Large Families (Asfanuca), disagrees. For her, this ordinance is neither appropriate nor understandable: “Of course, we live in a free country. Very free, as we can see. But there are things I do not support and cannot agree with.”
In Carnero’s opinion, nudist practices are not “respectful” when there are children around.
Meanwhile, Pilar García, president of the local Residents’ Association in Fuerte San Lorenzo del Barrio de Puntales, says that “there are more important things”: “With all the problems the city has, the government is concerned about naturism. Cádiz continues to be in a state of neglect and the Consistory focuses on nudist beaches. [The Mayor] has completely forgotten about the difficulty of mobility and parking in the city, the lack of measures to encourage trade and other issues that are of real interest to the people of Cádiz.”
Be that as it may, this summer anyone will be able to sunbathe nude on La Caleta, La Victoria, Santa María del Mar and Cortadura beaches. According to the local government, the modification of the Beach Ordinance “is the result of a process of citizen participation to adapt the regulatory text to the needs of society, through the contributions made by the social agents who in one way or another are affected by the use and management of the beaches”.
The new regulation also means bicycles can be ridden along the beaches and allows dogs to use the beach during the entire low season, usually between October and Easter.
The real question that everyone wants to know, though, is where exactly the beach begins and ends. Is the chiringuito beach bar part of the beach, and we’ll see naked people sitting on the barstools? Does it include the paseo marítimo promenade or is it just on the sand? These questions remain unanswered, but soon all may be laid bare.
Image 1: Archive
Image 2: Wikimedia commons
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