Vancouver is home to Canada’s first and largest clothing optional beach, but locals who regularly hike down the steps to Wreck Beach are worried tourists – and gawkers – are taking over.

“We’re one of the top 10 nude beaches in the world,” said Judy Williams, chairperson of the Wreck Beach Preservation Society. “For people who are incarcerated in concrete, steel, and glass most of their days, they can escape that and come down to the beach and be one with nature.”

At nearly eight kilometres long, Wreck Beach at the western tip of Vancouver’s Pacific Spirit Park is North America’s largest clothing optional beach. Tourists flock to the beach from all over the world - but concerned regulars say many out of towners and some young locals just don’t get it.

Many newcomers see it as a party beach and don’t take their clothes off, notes Williams, adding they also put down people who are naked.

“It’s the newcomers who don’t understand what clothing optionality and naturism is all about,” Williams said. “Naturism is about freedom and being at one with nature rather than sexuality and exhibitionism.”

Besides partying, some people come to the beach solely to gawk: two young men were called out on Reddit last summer for taking photos of a nude sunbather.

Williams says she knows not everyone comes to Wreck Beach to bare it all, but she is tired of beach goers treating nude sunbathers like zoo animals.

“Let’s grow up and be more like our European brothers and sisters,” she said, noting it’s up to regulars to educate newbies about the beach.

“I think the culture has been kept up by the locals here… Wreck Beach will never lose the essence of what it is – it doesn’t matter what yahoos are going to come down.”

With files from CTV Vancouver’s Shannon Paterson