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From Sougia there's no need to seek out naturist beaches, but my contributors can't have been the first hot walkers to swim naked at the inviting little beach below the ancient site. The hour's walk from Sougia is through an especially pretty gorge, and the site includes the finest mosaic (below, right) we ever saw outside a museum (where this one probably should be).
26°C
2004: Summer - two reports, from early and late summer, report tar on Lissos beach - otherwise fine.
2008: September - the beach was still fine for nudity.
2010: In July a contributor found various walkers and a textile Greek family that had arrived by boat. The trek over from Sougia seems to have become very popular. The situation varies, so go with the flow.
2014: Reports from September and October Lissos Beach was generally textile by 'default', and anything different meant visitors gauging those around them. Deciding whether or not to go (or stay) nude was, as Captain Barefoot suggests in this article, a case of going with the flow on the day, or making the first move to go nude (which, more often than not, as found in other parts of Crete, would actually cause a domino effect once you set things into motion).
Visiting earlier in the day (say, before 11am) or later afternoon is probably best if you are fully 'intending' to go and be nude on Lissos beach, rather than as a spontaneous decision following a hike there. Earliest boats from Sougia to Lissos are around 11am, if memory serves. It was common to have the beach to myself when hiking to Lissos in the morning from Sougia. Once 12 noon comes, and until 5pm or so, it then depends on the people around you, or courage.
In early to mid-September, Lissos beach was generally being visited by individual hikers or couples joining E4 from Sougia or Paleochora, or taking the small boat from Sougia, leading to some women choosing to go topless, and sometimes nude swimming. In later September and into October, there seemed to be a rise in large formal hiking 'groups' who were stopping at the beach while on the E4 hiking route from Paleochora to Sougia, many of whom were much older members of European society going to great lengths to retain modesty. It is worth remembering that boats also come from Paleochora, and sometimes families visit the beach so use common sense and moderation.
On my later visits to Lissos Beach, if I had been there nude for hours already, draping a towel over me lightly until gauging new arrivals was best when a new boat first approached. If everything then felt too conservative afterwards, I would swim to areas around Lissos beach (many great and secluded places west and east of it, accessible by rock hopping or swimming).
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