Michael and Shannon Freise
Michael and Shannon are life long nudists, visiting nudist resorts across the USA and around the world; having traveled to 22 countries and 44 states. Our home is on the South Shore of Massachusetts. We are members of Sandy Terraces Associates on Cape Cod. Our love of travel takes us away for 2-3 months at a time to various locations around world visiting naturalists/nudists resorts as much as possible.
Vritomartis Naturist Resort Review
In the Spring of 1988, my wife and I attended an Open House at Prairie Haven Nudist Park in Scranton, KS. After overcoming our initial nervousness, we fell in love with the freedom of nude recreation and the community. Ever since that epic summer of fun and sun, we have visited nudist resorts across the USA and around the world. So far, we have traveled to 22 countries and 44 states. After learning about Vritomartis Naturist Resort in our AANR publication, we booked two weeks for September 2024.
Vritomartis Naturist Resort is located on the Greek Island of Crete near Chora Sfakion (Sfakia), a small coastal village on the Mediterranean Sea. This part of Southern Crete is one of the most rugged, unspoiled and dramatic in the whole coastal region. It makes for a very private place and an ideal location for a naturist resort. The resort caters to couples, families and solo travelers. The resort requires nudity at the pool and is clothing optional on the grounds and the naturalist beach. During the day when eating at the pool bar or the beach bar your bottom should be covered. Clothing is required inside the hotel and in the evening at the indoor/outdoor dining area and the indoor/outdoor bar area. Guests dressed in all sorts of attire in the evening, from very casual to resort dressy. The evening attire was more conservative than other nudist resorts we have visited, as people dressed for going out to eat at a public restaurant. We found these guidelines a little restrictive, as we are used to resorts that allow more nudity in the evening. Particularly when you are outdoors enjoying dancing and entertainment.
The resort is very clean and well-maintained. The website photos accurately represent the property. The views of the Mediterranean Sea and Gavdos Island are beautiful. The 25 meter swimming pool is crystal clear and heated by the sun. In September, that provided for some brisk morning swims. There is also a small children’s pool. There are wooden lounge chairs and umbrellas poolside. While they don’t allow for reserving seats and will remove stuff from unoccupied chairs, they do fill up early in the morning. However, there are stacks of aluminum lounge chairs that can be set up around the grounds. We preferred the aluminum lounge chairs because they offer more opportunity for moving into the shade. They have both a naturalist and public beach within a 10-minute walk from the resort or hop on the shuttle that runs to the naturalist beach or town frequently throughout the day.
Make your reservations early as the resort fills up quickly. There are many returning guests that booked the same room for next year before they depart. Some folks we met had been going there annually for 22 years; other people we met were mostly repeat visitors. It’s very popular with Europeans, but we did meet a few Americans on our trip. We booked our 14 day stay 9 months in advance and agreed to three room changes to accommodate our reservation. The resort took care of moving everything for us, yet we still had to pack up our stuff. We stayed in three different room configurations. One room was in a bungalow, and two of the rooms were in the main hotel. The bungalows are smaller buildings located around the premises. There are several bungalow configurations. We preferred the bungalow because you could get a nice sea breeze through the room by opening the windows. Some bungalows are on the second level and require taking the stairs. All of the rooms in the main hotel open to a hall on one side, so
there is one sliding glass door. Our superior sea view room had an amazing view with a large patio that had two lounge chairs, a table, two chairs and an umbrella. However, the patio was directly over the bar area, so it was noisy at night. The standard sea view room was the same configuration inside as the superior sea view with a smaller patio that had a table and two chairs.
At the time of booking the resort, we transferred funds to pay the 50% deposit. At check-out, we paid the balance along with our beverages, lunch and snack expenses with a credit card.
Excursions, spa services and gift shop purchases require payment in Euros. Cash is king, bring plenty of Euros. The gift shop offers bottled water, drinks, alcohol, beer, snacks, souvenirs and sundries at reasonable prices. There is a small gym there that is well-equipped, but you have to make an appointment in advance at the front desk.
The service and hospitality is outstanding! The staff is very helpful and pleasant. They will bend over backwards to assist, answer questions and arrange excursions and transportation. They are available 24-hours a day. We can’t say enough about everyone that works there. As is common in the resort service industry, they work 6 days a week, 12-18 hours a day, with a short 2-3 hour break. We made sure to tip them for their hard work and attentive manner.
Breakfast and dinner buffets are included in your room fee. The breakfast buffet consists of typical breakfast foods. There are no made to order breakfast options. Yogurt topped with nuts and honey, hard boiled eggs, bread and fruit quickly became our go to breakfast. The dinner buffet has an extension salad bar, a carving station, hot food station and dessert bar (my favorite part of the meal. We found the dinner buffet lacking, as the hot station food was often dry, overcooked or oily. It was like a bad college cafeteria experience. We ended up eating big salads, fresh vegetables, rice, pasta and the best looking protein option. The meat fresh off the grill was often the safest choice. The wine list is pretty extensive, but the Greek wines we had were very light bodied. There is a bar that offers cocktails and they were good but small pours and very pricey. We were told that every season there’s a new chef and in 2023 they had a superb chef.
Lunch is on your own expense and not included in the room fee. You can choose the poolside bar or the beach taverna. Both have limited options that don’t vary. We found this food tastier than the buffets. They have limited hours and of the two, we found the beach taverna the better option. A third option is to go into Chora Sfakion (Sfakia) where there are a lot of good restaurant choices for lunch. You can also get breakfast and outstanding dinners. There’s a shuttle schedule or you can walk the 25 minutes but we recommend you take the shuttle back. It can be a beat down in the sun and is mostly uphill.
The resort is in a remote section of southern Crete. Chania is a 60 minute drive and Heraklion is a 90 minute drive. The terrain is very rocky desert like mountains. We flew into Chania and booked transportation through the resort to get to the resort. When we departed the resort organized transportation to the Heraklion port from which we took the overnight ferry to Athens. Many people book a car in advance and drive from the airport. The public bus is also an
alternative, but it can be time consuming. Those that we spoke to that booked cars mainly drove them to Chora Sfakion and the beach for which the hotel offers a daily shuttle schedule. Driving some of the mountain roads can be treacherous. We did try to book a car after we arrived for a couple of days to go sightseeing, but there was no availability. If you would like to drive, make sure you book your car in advance.
I recommend book excursions through the hotel. Every excursion we did was well organized and we really enjoyed every outing. They give you an opportunity to better socialize with other guests. We met some very fun people. You pay up front in Euro’s at the time you register for excursions.The boat tours are weather dependent. They have quite a few hiking offerings, wine tasting and war museum, dinner trips and other activities. The West coast boat trip is not to be missed and the dinner boat trips are also great fun. Loutro is a must see. Make your selections early, right after you arrive, as some have limited space. On our return visit, we plan to rent a boat for the day and do our own touring around the coast.
Guests can find the daily resort activities posted on a marquee in advance, usually starting at 8 AM and running through the day until 5 PM. It’s a great way to meet people and get involved. The Animators (the people running the activity) put out a lot of effort in making them fun. Every evening except Sunday, they had some sort of entertainment on the bar patio. Karaoke, a live band, several DJ’s.You will find they all seem to prefer American and English music with a very similar song list. I heard “Take Me Home, Country Roads” or “Raining Men” more times than I care to remember.
In summary, We enjoyed our time at Vritomartis. We loved the resort and it was our first introduction to Greek living. It was our most relaxing, easy going vacation to date. The overall experience was much different than other nudist resorts we have visited. It was more conservative and the nightlife was more low keyed. While the bar was open most of the night, all of the guests seemed to be in bed by 11:00 PM. I am not sure if it was the time of year, as the majority of guests were couples over 50 or if it was because it was a family naturist resort. We met people from the UK, Germany, Austria, Brussels, Poland, Spain, South Africa, India and Japan. Most everyone was able to converse in English. The only low light of the trip was the food. We are foodies and the quality and repetition became monotonous. When we visit again, we will shorten our stay at Vritomartis, maybe stay a couple nights in Chania and take ferries to visit other Greek islands.