True Blue Sailing to take on naked travellers

Nudity warning: A popular Whitsunday cruise operator says business has been a ‘bit of a slog’ since Covid but 30 naturalists setting sail might just be the secret to exposing a new market.

This weekend the New Horizon will head out on a trip it has done so many times before, with one stark difference.

Its passengers plan to travel nude.

While the boat is no stranger to the occasional streaker on board, it will take about 30 naturalists from the social media movement, Get Naked Australia.

The group believe nudity is not something to fear, but rather to be embraced and celebrated.

True Blue Sailing operations manager Phil Browne explained how they came to book the New Horizon.

“It was put in place months ago during the Covid chaos, we were doing a lot of private charters because our market is mainly 18-35s and backpackers and that obviously disappeared during Covid,” Mr Browne said.

New Horizon will take on-board a naked group. Picture: Supplied.

“We got contacted through our Instagram account and the group was like ‘hey any chance we could have a private charter on the boat but be naturalists?’.

“To which we giggled and thought it could be kind of fun, spoke to the authorities to say ‘hey have you got any issues with a boat full of naked people?’.”

After all the necessary checks with authorities were conducted, the trip was booked in with the advice to avoid beaches where other people would be.

Passengers will head out on the two day, two night cruise where guests will enjoy the region’s secluded bays and some “beautiful little spots” for a snorkel and swim.

“The question is whether they will be going down the water slide naked as well,” Mr Browne said.

Overall, Mr Browne said it was something the crew looked forward to hosting and allowing the naturalists to “do what they love”.

“It’s something very different from the very normal backpackers getting drunk and the fun and games that brings us,” he said.

“My skipper has intimated that as he comes out to do the quick brief before they depart, he may just get naked himself just to set things off, that has obviously terrified the rest of the crew.

“Thankfully it is winter so they might choose to have clothes on more than not but I dare say during the sunny afternoons that we are definitely going to be getting, it should be glamour to be naked.”

Mr Browne described the period since the pandemic began as “a bit of a slog” and he was grateful for the naked travellers for bringing a “giggle” to the company.

“Pretty much since the beginning we’ve been affected, our market was 99.9 per cent backpackers so to have that entire market literally switched off overnight, you just can’t plan for that,” he said.

As for whether nude trip offers may be a future tourist attraction for the company, the operations manager would not rule out the idea.

“I think if this group comes back and says, ‘that was brilliant’ … and ‘so many members are going to love this’, we’d love to have another chat and see what we can do,” he said.

“If it’s booked in advance, it’s not a problem at all because we can (cancel) the normal trip we would do and just make sure it is available for them.”