La Jenny Naturiste: A Review of Naked Bliss in France

Hey naked guys and gals, I’m back from my trip to La Jenny Naturiste Village, and I have to say, Belinda Carlisle was right . . . Heaven is a Place on Earth — that place, of course, being located on the French Atlantic coast.

You can probably guess that this review will be overwhelmingly positive. Now, much to my dismay, I am not a world traveler, like YouTuber sensations Nick and Lins, but I’ve hit all the major nudie spots in my home state of Florida: Paradise Lakes, Caliente, Lake Como, and Cypress Cove. My wife and I have also been to Hidden Beach in Cancun. And while Cypress Cove has long held the top spot for us (it’s like “Disneyland” for naked people), La Jenny has proven to be on a whole other level.

La Jenny doesn’t label itself a resort, but a “village.” The reason for this becomes clear as soon as you drive onto the property. It’s HUUUUGE . . . very much resembling a French-style villa, with cabins of various shapes and sizes scattered throughout a heavily wooded area. And, like any authentic village, La Jenny is entirely self-sufficient. You could pretty much live there the entire summer without needing to leave. The grocery store is stocked with everything you could possibly need—like a mini Publix—from cereals to deli meats to breads (even gluten-free) to over a dozen different kinds of wine. A “meat truck” delivers steaks, sausages, and cuts of pork daily. My wife and I didn’t feel like spending our vacation cramped over a stove, so we ate at one of the two restaurants for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. France is renowned for its cuisine, and La Jenny did not disappoint. Want freshly-squeezed orange juice to go with your croissant? The topless server with the cute smile will gladly bring it poolside.

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Oh, and did I mention you can go naked ANYWHERE . . . 24/7? My wife, who does not consider herself a nudist but doesn’t mind doing as the Romans do, was hesitant to take full advantage of this freedom, and she wasn’t the only one. It continues to baffle me why anyone who visits a clothing-optional venue would choose to go textile, but we saw more than a few folks donning shorts, underwear, and even tank tops. La Jenny has a strict no-dress dress code, but it’s almost never enforced, which I found disappointing. I’d have preferred it if everyone were naked all the time. This way, people new to the lifestyle or those hesitant to strip down completely will feel more encouraged to do so. Allowing fully clothed people to mingle with nudists sends mixed messages about what is proper and what is not. That being said, I get why someone may wish to keep their bottoms covered. Women have to deal with their special monthly visitor. There’s also sunburn (quite a few visitors wore t-shirts without bottoms, which just looked silly); however, we also came across office workers, judging by their attire, who were running late for work.

Upon our first arrival, most everyone at the grocery store adhered to an unwritten “no shirt, no shoes, no service” policy, which is why my wife worried I’d be thrown out with my penis out. A few days later, the policy seemed to flip, and every shopper went Full Monty starkers. Half of these folks were our age or older, but quite a few were in their twenties, dispelling the myth that we’re all old and saggy. One girl looked like she stepped straight out of an ’80s Playboy centerfold, and nobody paid any attention to her. OK, maybe I was, but not for the usual reasons. Even the relatively young baker didn’t bat an eye as she leaned her bare butt over the counter to reach for the baguette. Going from this to my wife’s hometown in Morocco gave me cultural whiplash a week later. The kids and I play burqa bingo whenever we see a woman dressed from head to toe like a ninja, and I can’t help but wonder what a conservative Muslim might think about this young tourist traipsing around as God made her, without anyone harassing her or giving her suggestive remarks. This is what society should be, folks! This is the essence of nudism.

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La Jenny wouldn’t be any fun if all we did was hang out at the grocery store. Fortunately, there are more activities to do than we could fit into our four-day schedule. Among other things, the village offers tennis, padel (Europe’s answer to pickleball), golf, volleyball, archery, and cycling. Oddly, there was no pool volleyball, which I have long maintained is the go-to sport for nudists. We tried playing golf, only to discover that we needed a special permit to get on the green (golf is serious business, apparently), but they let us whack some balls around at the driving range, which was a lot harder than it looks. The archery range (complete with a turban-wearing instructor) was a lot easier than I imagined (I hit the bullseye several times), and I got to live out my Feral Girl fantasies for the day. Fun anecdote: the woman shooting arrows next to me could not believe that in America, of all places, public nudity is illegal. “Not even topless?” She was shocked. Really.

But the standout activity for me was nude cycling. I’ve been wanting to attend the World Naked Bike Ride for decades, being that I’m a nudist and own a $2000 TREK bike, but I never had the chance to visit London or Portland during the rides. But let me tell you, the feeling of air rushing over your pores as you go barrelling down a hill — while a bit daunting — is heaven on wheels. And given the size of the place, biking is essential for getting from A to B.

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Oh, did I mention the giant chessboard? Yep, you can play chess with 2-foot-tall pieces. Our game lasted until 8 PM, after it started to get chilly enough for me to want to throw something on, making it hard for me to focus and resulting in my losing my queen. “Excuses, excuses,” my wife says. Near the end of our stay, by mid-June, the sun stayed up until 10 PM(!), and the temperature never dropped below 72°F, making for ideal naked weather. I’d worried so much about the cold that I reached out to Nick and Lins to get their input.

The pools are fantastic. There is a shallow one for the kids (we saw quite a few families with tots running about freely), and an Olympic-length pool for those of us who actually want to swim. Imagine that! Swimming in a swimming pool!

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Since early adulthood, I’ve had to scour the Greek islands for beaches to drop trou, but I’ve rarely been to an officially designated nude beach. My wife and I went to Haulover in Miami, but it’s far too crowded for my tastes, and the gawkers make her uncomfortable. Hidden Beach in Cancun is picturesque, but the water is full of coral reefs and therefore inaccessible (something they should probably advertise but don’t!). Besides my disdain for crowds and swimtrunks (when my crotch fills with sand and the elastic band cuts grooves into my waist), I hate plastic chairs you have to pay for, or when the beach gets turned into an outdoor nightclub. I strive to reunite with nature, and that’s hard to do when you’re tripping over some guy’s towel as techno music deafens you from a minibar speaker.

That being said, the beach at La Jenny is heaven on Earth. You’ll want to rent a bike to get there, since it’s a bit of a hike. There’s also a gate separating the cabin area from the coast, and a sign prohibiting nudity, which everyone ignores, thankfully. Nobody we met along the way bothered covering up, and I sure as heck wasn’t about to.

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The beach itself is MASSIVE — like FUTURAMA Nude Beach Planet massive — so even if it hadn’t been designated for nudism, you’d have no trouble finding a secluded spot to free your bits. That’s the tactic I used in Greece, where public nudity isn’t technically allowed, but nobody cares so long as you keep to yourself. I can’t tell you how many times I used to struggle to find my unfeathered peeps, yet here, bathing suits are as common as they are on Mars. The secluded parts of the Greek islands, mind you, can be rugged, but at La Jenny, the sand was like gold silk, and the water looked clear enough to drink. The only downside: the Atlantic can be FRIGID!!! So much so, my Gulf of Mexico (not Gulf of America)-bathtub-raised self couldn’t stand to get in for more than a second, and only because my wife jumped in first, proving she married a wimp.

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OK, Nick, but what’s the real scoop? La Jenny can’t be all great, can it? Well, if you’re dragging your significant other to a naturist haven and getting his/her kit off isn’t his/her thing, they may be less inclined to overlook the downsides. La Jenny isn’t the Ritz, OK? It’s more accommodating to people like me who like to rough it. My wife was horrified after finding spiders in the shower, and when the toilet wouldn’t flush properly, she nearly had a mental breakdown. That’s not to say the good folks at the front desk won’t take care of it, but you’ll have to ask them, and they may not show up right away. We also had no TV, and the WiFi never worked.

I don’t go looking to reconnect with nature only to gripe about internet access. I can live without Facebook for a week. But despite a lack of amenities, the wife did enjoy herself. She loved the beach about as much as I did, and Bordeaux is only an hour’s drive from the village, and it’s one of the most beautiful cities in France, next to Paris.

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Is La Jenny all it’s cracked up to be? Let me put it this way: why am I here when I could be there? That’s what I keep thinking. I need to go back, and soon, only I can’t imagine when that’ll be. For me, La Jenny is much more than a vacation destination; it’s a glimpse into a shameless world, a world without clothes, a world as it should be.

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