What actually happens on a No Sex Gay Weekend

People hear the name and imagine all sorts. The honest answer, as I said on Friend of Dorothy, is that it's just a really fun weekend, the kind you would have with mates. The whole thing is just a pretext to get to know each other.

Here is what that looks like in practice.

Before you arrive

Weekends run Saturday to Sunday afternoon, with an optional Friday evening if you want to come early and meet people. Normally 15 to 20 people come. Most come alone and don't know anyone. Most are single, but there are people in relationships as well.

You book your own hotel and travel, or you already live there. I'm not a travel agent. If I booked the hotels I'd be responsible for all of it, and I'm just me. The activities are included, and these days most of the food is too: normally two dinners, coffees, drinks. I don't want people going around paying for their own meal. It's kind of awkward, and I want it to feel like you don't have to worry about extra spend.

Everyone signs up on the website and agrees to the philosophy and code of conduct before they come, so everyone arrives with the same intention. That's what makes the rest work.

The welcome

My job at the beginning is to make people feel really welcome. I'm just really pleased people have come. If they're at a weekend, they've literally paid money to come on this kind of weird concept with this random guy. That's a risk, and I'm grateful for it.

I always do name tags, because otherwise you're worrying about people's names, and that's an anxiety you don't need. I'll put people into little groups for first conversations. Sometimes I'll do a "closest to" question, a quiz question with a number for an answer, so you can be wrong but you have to have an answer. There's no prize. I don't care about the answer. It's just an excuse to talk.

The awkward moments of any group are arriving, being stuck with someone when you want to move on, introducing yourself, and not remembering names. If you solve those, people get on with it. Within half an hour people are just chatting amongst themselves. When I try to make a group speech, by the end of the day they're ignoring me, because they're talking to each other.

The days

In Oxford, our first weekend, we met for coffee and went on a tour of the city. We had a picnic and played Traitors. The murderers won. We went punting, and people got stuck under a bush. We went to a jazz bar. The next day we went for a countryside walk, had a pub roast, and did more exploring.

In Bath, about 15 of us came. People who arrived early went to a piano bar on the Friday, and we caught a bit of the rugby in the rain. On Saturday we had coffees and a tour of Bath, where I spoke about columns at length, because I'm so interesting. We went to Boom Battle Bar, had dinner, and on Sunday had a roast and went to the Roman Baths. By mid Saturday they'd just started having a great time amongst themselves and making friends.

Some of it is a bit out of people's comfort zone, on purpose. We went bowling once and there was a lot of fear around it beforehand, the fear of being terrible at bowling in front of a group of strangers. They loved it.

Downtime

I used to fill the days a lot. Now there are some activities, which are really fun, bond people together, and give people things to talk about, but mostly it's about the social interaction. I used to do impromptu quizzes, and they were like, "just shut up, Chris." So I do fewer, and let people talk to each other.

Downtime and breaks matter as well. Every activity is optional, and you can take a break whenever you like. What I don't want is anyone standing around wondering what we're doing now. It's a well-planned, well-run city break. Then there's room inside it.

The rule, in practice

There are no banners and no branding. I don't go around shouting "we're on a no sex gay weekend." Sometimes a cheeky person will push the boundaries as a joke, normally with me, and it's just an opportunity to have a bit of fun.

As for policing it, I told Pink Ticket Travel the truth in 2025: "I think it's about attitude. I would expect people to follow the rules, especially when you're with the group in a public place." We're not perfect, and nobody's checking rooms. It works because everyone chose to come.

What it gives you is simple. If I'm getting to know you and then you go off and talk to someone else, I don't have to worry about jealousy, and neither do you. We can just get to know each other.

Afterwards

We did a four-day residential at a manor house in Devon over Easter. It was extremely hard work, and it was so cool. Most weekends end with goodbyes on a Sunday afternoon, and people stay in touch. As I told Queerty, "I think a lot of people come away from the weekend feeling good about themselves, because they've let other people give them a chance at actually connecting."

Upcoming weekends are on weekends, and write-ups of the ones we've run are on past weekends.