We all want to let our hair down on holiday. But some people are letting everything go, even their underwear.

Nude cruises – or ‘nakations at sea’ – are booming, as a growing number of travellers leave their inhibitions at home.

But, if you’re picturing a sweaty free-for-all on deck, or passengers hooking up left, right and centre, think again. 

Travel company Bare Necessities has been taking passengers sans clothing on week-long cruises to the Caribbean and beyond since 1991.

The demand has risen dramatically over the last 30 years. The first-full nude cruise began with a 30-passenger dive boat in the Bahamas, now they operate 2,000 person cruises on huge Vessels ran by top cruise companies like Carnival and Holland America.

And from departure to dock, they’re non-sexual. In fact, naturist cruising comes with its surprisingly strict rules.

Curious? Metro looks at six unexpected things that happen on a nude cruise. 

1. Do all passengers have to be nude?

Despite what the name suggests, you’re not actually required to strip off.

While many passengers will be clothes-free while sunbathing, swimming or lounging around, you won’t get booted off for covering up. 

Bare Necessities welcomes newcomers, and there’s a casual and accepting vibe.

However, the website does warn that most passengers find themselves more relaxed and withholding less of who they are without the barrier of clothing. Got it.

2. Is clothing ever required?

If you’ve booked a nude cruise, you might be tempted to pack light. But don’t go overboard: you’ll need to bring a few bits along with you. 

On Bare Necessities cruises, clothing is required in certain areas. That includes the dining room, where all meals are served.

According to the website, casual attire is fine, but you can’t use bathrobes to cover up.

Passengers must also cover up while docked alongside a port or beside other ships in a port.

When the ship is at sea, or anchored in a port, it’s fine to bare all, unless an announcement has been made to say otherwise. 

So, bring a full suitcase (and plenty of sunscreen).

3. Are the staff nude too?

If you’re expecting everyone to be in the buff, you’ll be disappointed.

Staff members, including cruise singers, cleaners, and the Captain, are all clothed, so it’s never a fully nude cruise. 

You might be stark naked while ordering a piña colada, but the bartender will be fully dressed. 

4. Do cruises even use towels?

One thing you can probably leave behind is a towel. 

Cruise operators ask passengers to always sit on a towel if they’re naked, whether it’s on a sun lounger, a bar stool, or eating at the cruise buffet. 

Towels are provided as an unofficial naturist dress code throughout the ship. There’ll be fresh beach towels in your room and stacks of smaller towels on board.

5. Everyone’s just having sex, right? 

No. At least, not blatantly. 

Since there’s nudity involved, many passengers assume things might get a little frisky. But you’re on the wrong cruise if you’re expecting anything like that to happen. 

Naturist cruises are different to swingers of Lifestyle cruises, which allow sexual exploration and intimate encounters. (There are plenty of companies that offer this style of cruising, if that’s more up your street).

Sexual behaviour in public spaces is prohibited and will get you kicked off.

Lingerie, fetish-wear and ‘excessive’ genital jewellery are also banned, according to Bare Necessities’ rules. The goal is about body positivity, nothing else. 

6. Do the usual cruise activities still take place?

From dance classes to karaoke, pool games, music and excursions, a nude cruise still offers all the classic cruise activities, just minus the clothes.

Although you’ll probably not see any conga lines or line dancing without a single item of clothing on. 

Do you have a story to share?

Get in touch by emailing MetroLifestyleTeam@Metro.co.uk.

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Justin is a personal finance author and seasoned business journalist with over a decade of experience. He makes it his mission to break down complex financial topics and make them clear, relatable, and relevant—helping everyday readers navigate today’s economy with confidence.

Before returning to his Middle Eastern roots, where he was born and raised, Justin worked as a Business Correspondent at Reuters, reporting on equities and economic trends across both the Middle East and Asia-Pacific regions.

To drive through Detroit is to move through a landscape shaped by both its storied industrial legacy and its long-standing creative community, where generations of artists have turned the city’s factories, urban prairies and waterfront into a living canvas.

The third installment of the WBEZ and Chicago Sun-Times visual art road trip heads east to Detroit and its smaller neighboring cities, where the materials of the past — steel, brick, salvaged wood — aren’t just inspiration but building blocks in a vibrant cultural landscape.

The Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation houses iconic objects from American life. “It’s just huge, like the size of an airplane hangar,” said Shelley Selim, the Mort Harris Curator of Automotive, Industrial and Decorative Design at the Detroit Institute of Arts. “There’s a Buckminster Fuller Dymaxion House there, and the Eames ‘Mathematica’ exhibition that they designed for a World’s Fair for IBM.” Next door, Greenfield Village recreates streetscapes from centuries past, with historic homes, steam engines and a glassblowing studio where visitors can watch artists at work.

Arab American communities have been rooted in east Dearborn for more than a century. Many families arrived in the early 20th century to work for Ford and other automakers. In 2023, it became the country’s first city with an Arab American majority.

Before leaving town, Hashem’s Nuts & Coffee Gallery offers a fragrant stop. Shelves are packed with Middle Eastern spices, roasted coffees, and hard-to-find blends like ras el hanout. Selim makes regular trips to the shop where she stocks up on jumbo Brazilian cashews.

The Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA) houses one of the country’s most significant public collections. At its center is the Diego Rivera Court, named after the renowned Mexican painter and muralist who vividly portrayed social inequity, labor struggles and industrialization. “It rewards you every time you look at it,” said Selim. “There’s even a cheat sheet in the tile floor — little carved labels tell you what each panel depicts.” Rivera’s 1932 fresco of the Ford Rouge Plant stretches across four walls and grapples with the tensions between machines, myth, labor and land.

Nearby, “Quilting Time,” a large mosaic by Romare Bearden, pays tribute to communal labor and visual abstraction. “It is just a really stunning representation of community, of women coming together,” Selim said. “And the abstraction of the quilts is just spectacular.”

East of the museum, the Shepherd — a decommissioned Catholic church — has been converted into a contemporary art space by Library Street Collective, a Detroit-based organization known for turning historic buildings into community cultural hubs.

The show, which runs through Aug. 30, also includes work by Midwest sculptor and activist Jordan Weber, whose installation features a spliced GTO Judge — a muscle car originally built by Black assembly line workers — emerging from the floor like a buried relic. The sculpture echoes Weber’s ongoing collaboration with Canfield Consortium, a local nonprofit in the East Canfield neighborhood, which has long grappled with industrial pollution from nearby auto factories. There, Weber installed an air-quality beacon and plans to plant a conifer forest to absorb airborne pollutants.

Public art like Weber’s builds on a long legacy of community-based arts efforts in Detroit. One of the most recognizable is The Heidelberg Project, started in the 1980s by artist Tyree Guyton, who transformed his family’s former home — and eventually two surrounding blocks left in disrepair after the 1967 uprising — into a colorful, ever-evolving wonderland.

For a different kind of spin through history, Submerge is home to the techno label Underground Resistance. Glenn calls it “the world’s first known techno museum.” The space includes a basement record store and rotating tours led by Detroit music legends like Jon Dixon and Cornelius Harris.

Across town, on the city’s West Side, the Dabls Mbad African Bead Museum spans an entire block. “The founder, Olayami Dabls, really appreciated the symbolic and cultural significance of beads within the African and African diasporic communities,” Selim said. “It’s a really cool artist-created environment.”

John K. King Used & Rare Books, located in a former glove factory just west of downtown, feels suspended in time. “Every sale is handwritten down in a ledger,” said Selim of the DIA. Pull-cord lights and floor-to-ceiling stacks make the browsing feel both intimate and endless. “You’ll always find something unique and interesting.”

Round out the day at Paramita Sound, a downtown wine bar and listening room that pairs vinyl sets with high communal tables and natural wine. “Even if you don’t want to talk to anyone,” said Glenn, “you’ll be socializing.”

Set on more than 300 acres of landscaped grounds and landmark architecture, Cranbrook Art Museum in Bloomfield Hills beckons as a design destination and a place to wander. “People just explore the grounds for landscape architecture and sculpture,” said Laura Mott, chief curator of the museum. “It’s really just one of the gems of America.”

The current show, “Eventually Everything Connects: Mid-Century Modern Design in the U.S.,” is an ambitious exhibition that revisits the midcentury design canon. “We’ve done a lot of work excavating individuals who are diversifying American modern design,” said Mott. That includes a “textile forest” that hangs from the museum ceiling and walls and features works by such designers as Alexander Girard, Ruth Adler Schnee and Olga Lee. The show is on view through Sept. 21.

For those making a weekend of it, ALEO Detroit offers a low-key, art-forward stay in Detroit’s East Village. Warda Bouguettaya, a James Beard Award–winning chef, runs the breakfast program, and the on-site bar Father Forgive Me opens in the afternoon. “The balcony is right above the bar,” said Glenn. “It’s like your backyard, but with better lighting.” And funky, orange wine.

Or try The Siren Hotel, which offers a gilded, atmospheric experience. Set in a former 1920s high-rise, the chic design leans maximalist: velvet upholstery, terrazzo floors and heavy drapery.

Elly Fishman is a journalist and author whose work explores immigration, incarceration and American culture, including the arts. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, GQ, Rolling Stone, WBEZ Chicago, among others. She is currently working on her second book, forthcoming from HarperCollins.