When Lizard came to Wreck Beach for the first time in 1970, he wanted to walk into the water and swim 'til he sank.
Instead, he stopped and watched the other bathers take off worries with their clothes and decided this place might be worth coming back to. Thirty-three years later, he sits on a wicker beach chair in mirrored shades and introduces me to his buddies. They’re deep in conversation, cursing each other out and reminiscing about fights with a friend who’s now gone.
To my right, a man sunbathes in the nude and tells me he’s been coming here for years. He points out his son playing in the water and says caring for a blind kid with autism isn’t always easy, but they always agree on the beach.
As Vancouver’s only official clothing-optional beach (and the most popular one in Canada), Ts'at'lhm, or Wreck Beach, is the place to be if you want to get away from that Vancouver freeze. With so many hippies and nudists in one place, there’s a sense of community that’s hard to miss, but not too unfamiliar to anyone who’s spent some time in BC’s small town draft-dodger colonies.
Apostate hippie kid that I am, this dynamic intrigues me — I amble down the stairs, don my sunscreen and drop my pants for a quick dip to get in the spirit of things. Then, after reclaiming my clothes, I introduce myself to anyone who seems friendly and interesting. I’m hoping to find some Wreck regulars, pick their brains on the beach’s culture and community and get their opinions on the city’s handling of this increasingly popular attraction.
I pass a woman in a yellow bikini selling ankle bracelets that reach down to wrap around your middle toe. I take a look and pick out a nice dark one for a friend who only wears black, and I ask the woman if she wants to talk about the beach.
She says her name is Tracy and that she’d love to chat, if it weren’t for the parking metre beside her car that must be ticking to zero right about now.
I offer to watch her wares in return for an interview, and she agrees, saying I’ll get a commission if I sell something. Though I love a good profit incentive as much as the next Vancouver renter, my mercantile instincts need honing.
When Tracy gets back, I don’t have much to show for my efforts, but we sit down to chat anyway.
She tells me “[it’s] the freedom and liberty to just do whatever you want” that keeps bringing her back to Wreck Beach. “If you have something to sell, whether it’s food, clothing, jewelery or even beverages, it’s just kind of free that way.”
I ask Tracy if she worries about voyeurs at the beach. “It’s not a worry so much as it’s just probably going to happen … People just want to look at naked people. [They] look at porn on the internet all the time; they can come here and see it in the flesh,” she says.
She’s seen conflict here before, like “[people] drinking too much [and] being rowdy and mean,” but she prefers the occasional altercation to heavy-handed RCMP presence.
“The world is meant for us to wander and live upon,” she says, gesturing at the mountains across the water. “They should just let things be, leave everybody alone.”
After saying my goodbyes to Tracy, I make for a large banner that says Paradise Grill. Underneath it, a man in khaki cargo pants is carrying coolers and cooking supplies into the shade. His name is Nova, and he’s one of several vendors with a licence from the city to sell at the beach. From the casual greetings he tosses to people he sees, I can tell he knows his way around Ts'at'lhm. He’s gearing up for a hot day of work, and he seems a little wary when I tell him why I’m here.
A young guy in blue shorts greets Nova. He’s grumbling something about mushrooms, and soon, he lets me in on the reason for their hesitancy: A few years back, a local paper apparently did a story on Wreck Beach, highlighting the voices of people who said they felt unsafe there.
This hurt more than just Ts'at'lhm’s privacy; as someone who makes his livelihood off of the summertime crowds, Nova says the ensuing decline in visitors harmed his bottom line significantly. I’ve since done some archive diving and couldn’t find any matching stories in their timeframe, but it seems the sentiment has not disappeared.
Nova tells me to come back in a few hours once the crowds die down, so I head to the water for another dip. As the cool water soothes my sun-cooked skin, I look back at the shore and have to admit to a sense of kinship that I’ve never felt at another beach. Seeing so many people gathering in one spot to reject a social norm is inspiring, and even a little endearing.
I dry myself off, then I head back to Nova. Things have calmed down at this point. He stands over a camp grill in a red shawl, frying up potatoes with his assistant, Brendan.
Nova tells me he’s been working at Wreck for thirteen seasons now, and he’s been cooking even longer than that. Sharing Jamaican food at his own grill here on the beach is important to him, and it seems business is good. I ask him about the culture at Ts'at'lhm, and how it’s changed over the years.
“It used to be a lot rowdier,” he says. “[Now] it’s more like a lot of students, foreigners and tourists.”
“Strong Kits Beach vibes,” Brendan chimes in, before shouting at a group of young men coming down the stairs with their phones out in front of them. ”No filming, guys! It’s a nude beach!” He points at the painted sign hung from a nearby pole: No Cameras Please — Keep the Beach Nude.
Nova doesn’t have a problem with the city’s official handling of the area, saying the RCMP presence has reduced in recent years. Even when they had a larger presence, they weren't stopping every creepy guy on the beach.
“We try to discourage that,” says Nova. “It makes people uncomfortable … We used to have a lot of perverts, [so] we started going around and informing girls when they come down here that if they have anybody … making them uncomfortable to come talk to us. The locals are the ones who are really policing this beach, to be honest.”
So whether you take it from the city or the locals, the message is clear — pervs aren’t welcome at Ts'at'lhm.
I thank Nova for his time and pull shoes over my sandy feet at the bottom of the Trail 6 stairs, listening to the sounds of a summer day at Ts'at'lhm. There are so many people talking and laughing, but you can still hear the waves through the noise.
I can’t tell you to visit Wreck Beach, since there’s too much you might not like. Drugs, alcohol, naked bodies and perverts — I was there for a day and found all that without even trying. But if campus life has you fed up (and you aren’t a creep yourself, because c’mon guys), then it might just be for you.
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