How to identify a safe beach in Tenerife

Tenerife, being an island, has beaches on all of its sides. But not all the beaches are safe for swimming. It is important to identify the safety of the beaches by the color of flag that you see at every beach. Different beaches display different colored flags. It is important to understand their significations by their colors before taking a plunge. They are red, green, yellow and blue. The beach with blue flag is a five star beach. It is clean, has all the safety precautions, has active life guards, has instant first aid services, restaurants, clean toilets, sea beds and all the facilities to enjoy the day at the beach. When you see a green flag, it indicates that the waves at this beach are well behaved and are trained not to display their bad temper. Yellow flag indicates that you have to make your own decision and swim at your own risk. All the safety precaution might not be available and you are in charge of making your own decisions. If you see the red flag, don’t even bother changing. On such days, the best option is to walk along the sea shore on the paved path that has colorful rock gardens or simply just patronize the café bars that have spread their furniture on those promenades.

Nudism at the beaches

I sit at the beach, fully dressed, under the shade of the big rock and the European lady in light blue bikini stares at me. I smile at her, enjoying the cool sea breeze. I shift my gaze towards the silver waters that gurgles, somersaults and waves at me. There are more white-skin-people, some of them bare from the top, enjoying the sea. Being an Indian, I am not used to taking off all my clothes to sun bathe on the beach and I would find this idea totally unacceptable. Even when I decide to swim, my swim-suit will not be so revealing. I am very shy and am very embarrassed if people stare. But here, in Tenerife, I have noticed that people don’t stare. They will give you a momentary glance, smile, and then, back to their own thoughts. When they come to the beach, they come to swim and sun bathe. There are many tourists at Tenerife beaches (that stretches over 200 miles of coastline,) and most of tourists are from nearby European countries. In European countries, many of the people are deprived of sunshine especially in winter and in spring and therefore they face many health problems and brittle bones due to deficiency of vitamin D (which comes from being exposed to ultraviolet rays from the sun). Spain is an interesting place for nudism and it is legal everywhere in Spain unless you are causing offence. Tenerife has many beaches and coves, and there are casual visitors daring to dress only in sunscreen for an afternoon by the sea. Only the color of their bottoms might give them away. There are official Nudist Beaches in Tenerife, the main ones are: Playa de la Tejita (El Médano) Playa de los Patos (La Orotava) Playa de las Gaviotas (Santa Cruz de Tenerife) Playa de la Tejita is the nearest one to Los Cristianos, (El Medano is about 10 miles away) and is very easy to get to. The beach is situated to the west of the town, the 'other side' of the Red Mountain. There is also a small (I believe un-official) Nudist area that can be found in Costa del Silencio, it is at the bottom of Yellow Mountain and is quite difficult to get to if you have any mobility problems. Then there are many hotels along the shore line that have private nude beaches where they can sun bathe freely without being disturbed or stared at. It is their way of being in harmony with nature which Indians need time to get used to. It all depends about when Indian men abandon their nature of staring too much.