Cayo Largo

[sunluver52]

Planning a trip for late sept and was wondering if fellow members have gone to Cayo Largo ,where they stayed and their reviews .

[Cdn_cpl]

We were there a few years ago, stayed at Sol Pelicano. Beaches are absolutely beautiful, each resort has both a textile and nude section right in front of the resort and there's literally miles of virgin beach if you want to find a spot on your own. We rented scooters and found a secluded spot on our own for an afternoon. Only complaint is the night-life is pretty much non-existent, just limited to what the resort offers. The food was also disappointing but we've found this to be the case for everywhere in Cuba. If you want a quiet relaxing place where you can be nude you'll love it, if you need a lot of activity and nightlife you might find it a little boring.

The beach is much better at the resorts to the west like the Sol and Sol Pelicano. At the resorts further east (Playa Blanca) the beach can often be very narrow. See www.caryolargo.net for lots of good info.

It will be a bit of a trek for you from Alberta, as far as I know the only connections are through Montreal with Air Canada, that's how we had to do it.

[eskimo888]

We have been to Cayo Largo we stayed at Sol Cayo Largo and loved it the beach to the west can be walked nude for miles as CDN cpl said the night life is only what the resort offers however we had allot of people on our resort that liked to party so night life was alright but could be hit and miss if your looking for a nude vacation I would reccomend it if you stay at Sol Cayo Largo if you request a room at the west end of the resort thr nude beach is just over the sea wall

[Mister Black]

The food was also disappointing but we've found this to be the case for everywhere in Cuba.

Agree

[Hey-Jesse]

Hey, do you go to the sol regularly?

[curious4play]

Hey, do you go to the sol regularly?

We were there First week in April 2014 & loved it !! best secluded beach for nude walking & sunbathing we have found yet, we are early risers so the late night life isn't that important to us. The food was fair to good not a lot of choices, but you don't go hungry & besides where can you go to an all-inclusive with a beach that beautiful & not gain weight !! lol

[free2tannude]

Going to Cayo Largo 10th to 23rd of April this year. Staying at the Ole Playa Blanca

[Markis]

We are planning a trip to Cuba in 2018. (2017 is already booked) We are definitely going to spend part of it in Cayo Largo. Looking forward to visiting a new island, and seeing these beautiful beaches. Especially being able to do it naked!!
Are most of the visitors European, Canadian, or Cubans?

[Cdn_cpl]

The majority of the visitors to Cayo Largo are Canadian and European. Most of the Canadians come from Quebec as a lot of the direct flights from Canada originate in Montreal. As for the Europeans, most are Italian, a large Italian tour company owns several of the resorts and markets them specifically to Italians. There are no Cubans living on the island, it's strictly a tourist destination. The resort employees are flown in on a 20 day rotation.

It's well worth the effort to get there, Cayo Largo has very beautiful beaches.

[CapnMorgan]

Here is a trip report I posted on another site...

December 1-8, 2014

Background:
Cayo Largo is an island about 80 kilometres off the south coast of Cuba directly south of Havana. It is about 27 kilometres long and only about 3 kilometres at the widest point. It appeared to me to be a large reef covered with sand and scrub brush, very flat with the highest point only about 15 feet above sea level.

There are no permanent residents and the sole industry is tourism. The hotel workers are brought in on 20 day rotational shifts (when the ferry is operational). There are about 6 hotels, all of them along the south coast of the island.

The two hotels with nude beaches are Sol Pelicano and Sol Cayo Largo. These hotels have the only officially sanctioned nude areas by the Cuban Government.

Our stay was at Sol Pelicano. To get to the beach you must cross a catwalk of about 75 metres over a preserved area to get from the hotel area to the beach. At Sol Pelicano you must go to the far left of the beach (facing the ocean) where this is a sign stating "Nudismo Naturism".

There are no umbrellas but there are Palapas, basically a large post with a frame on top and covered with palm fronds. There are also a couple of other tent-like shelters made of the same materials. To get a palapa we found that you must go early in the morning and "stake your claim" with a towel or other marking. The first 3 days all were taken so shade for us was at a minimum. After that I managed to get to the beach before 7 a.m. and stake a claim. I did notice that some were claimed for the whole week and hardly used. There were about 40 or so people using the Naturist area each day.

The most striking thing was the sand…we have been to Cuba before and they have notoriously white sand beaches but this was the finest white sand I have seen anywhere! Virtually white powder sand. The only problem was the sand was so fine it was hard to get off your feet after you left the beach!

The beach all along the south coast is very windy…even more so than Orient inSt. Martin and the water was very rough, especially the first few days with 2 – 3 foot waves breaking along the shoreline. Once you got past the first 10 metres or so it was a little easier but you had to roll with the waves. Only on the last day did it calm down but was still a little on the rough side.

We did not venture to the naturist beach at Sol Cayo Largo Hotel but did visit our friends who were staying at that hotel. They said there were about 150 people on the nude beach area there so it is much larger than the Sol Pelicano area. At Sol Cayo Largo to reach the nude beach you must go to the right facing the water to reach their nude area.

These two hotels are frequented mostly by Europeans, Canadians (mostly French Canadians) and South Americans. Language was a bit of a barrier, but we managed to somewhat overcome it by using "Espfranglais" (my own word) a mixture of Spanish, French and English. I estimate there were about 2 dozen native english speakers (Canadians) on the resort out of a few hundred guests. This is where we really miss our friends from the US!

We did visit a "vanilla" beach at Play Sirena about 6 kilometres away and found the same white powdery sand on a massive beach area.. It seems it is possible to walk most of the coast and never leave the sand!

Addendum

We were pleasantly surprised at the quality of Sol Pelicano. We have been to Cuba before in Guardalavaca and the food was not good and the room very dated, so our expectations were not high.

Our room at Sol Pelicano was updated and the bathroom was completely tiled. The only hint of anything being dated was the TV and there were only a few stations in English. The resort itself was very large and spread out and very well maintained. We were impressed with the quality of the food (especially after Guardalavaca). The only thing that was not available was lettuce for which you could substitute cabbage if you wished. There was also a great variety of food. The beef was tough but we have found that to be true of many places in the Caribbean.

The drinks were somewhat limited but the basics were there, Crystal and Buccanero were the beers (as always in Cuba) and of course the Cuban rums were always in great supply. They had the basic foo-foo drinks like Pina Colada, Mojito, etc. and we never noticed any shortage.

There is not much off the resort but we did go to the Marina which is where the Cuban workers stay when off shift. There is a turtle farm (really neat to see at the exorbitant entry fee of 1 peso), a bar, two souvenir kiosks, a bowling alley and a bank. We did stop at the bar to refresh ourselves, 2 beers and a shot of Irish Whisky came to 4 pesos (= 4 US$).

Of course tourism is the only industry on Cayo Largo so I think they really make an effort to make sure the island is well supplied.