Belgian couple Nick and Lins de Corte will be travelling light to SA.
They plan to be naked for most of their three-month stay in the country.
The De Cortes travel the world documenting their nude adventures on a blog, Naked Wanderings, and a corresponding Instagram account.
Their catchphrase is “Life is better without clothes”.
Speaking to TimesLIVE Premium ahead of their arrival in SA on Monday, Nick, 40, and Lins, 36, will begin their visit at SunEden Naturist Resort in Gauteng.
“We want to learn everything about naturism in SA and especially how it is connected with the local culture. We hope that we'll get the chance to meet many naturists and learn from them. We're also looking forward to visiting the beautiful naturist resorts and general tourist spots. And we're really looking forward to eating braai as well. We have a very long list with things we want to see and places we want to visit, and we're sure that three months will never be enough. But we'll try to get the most out of it,” Nick said.
Nick was an IT systems engineer and Lins a human resources manager before they decided to take the nude route.
A lot of people still have the wrong ideas about naturism. Some think it's sexual, some think it's only for perfect bodies or for people who don't care about how they look. And this keeps them from giving naturism a try.
— Lins de Corte
“We got into naturism via a spa centre where clothes are prohibited. These places are very common in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany, and are becoming very popular ... also among people who don't call themselves naturists but just like to enjoy a day naked in the spa. For us, this was the stepping stone into naturism.
“Over the years, when we got more and more into naturism, we also started to enjoy the other aspects such as the connection with nature, the feeling of equality among naturists, the mutual respect, and the very positive effect that naturism has on your body confidence,” said Lins.
By the end of their trip, the couple hope to be able to compare naturism in SA to the rest of the world.
“When we look at Asia, for example, SA has more naturist venues than all Asian countries together. What we're particularly interested in is to see how SA compares to South America. In the past, we've travelled a lot in South America and noticed a recent boom in naturism. We hope that we can find something similar in SA, and if that's not the case, help search for the spark that's needed to make naturism more popular,” Lins said.
SunEden’s marketing director Lofty Lutge said before the Covid-19 pandemic more than 100 international tourists visited the resort per year.
“We expect more than that in 2023. We already have some bookings for 2023. Visitors are mostly from the Netherlands, Germany, France, Britain, US, Australia and New Zealand.
“There are more than 100-million naturists worldwide. More than six-million German naturists go to other countries to naturist resorts and naturist beaches every year. If the naturist beaches like Umhlanga Lagoon, Mpenjati, Secrets in [Gqeberha] and Sandy Bay were legal naturist beaches then we could attract many international naturists to SA,” he said.
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