Destination Beach Wedding

bsmith289

I'm just curious for those of you that have had a destination beach wedding. Were you glad that you did it? And did you have a lot of people from out of town, or from the same town as you and had to travel there?

Did you love it, or do you wish that you had your wedding back home?

bsmith289

Or has anyone been invited to a destination wedding where they had to travel several hours and get a hotel room for? If so, what were your thoughts on that? Were you excited and couldn't wait to go? Or did you think it was a hassle?

Islamorada14

No regrets here!  We loved it!

However, I should also say that we chose a "destination wedding" because we knew 95% of our guests would have to travel no matter where we held our wedding.  We have no family and a very small group of friends where we live. All of our family and most friends are spread out all over the country.  We picked the Florida Keys because we figured it'd be a more fun destination for our guests to travel to than Kansas City or Illinois or Pennsylvania or Connecticut, etc.  If most of our family and friends were local, I'm not sure if we'd choose a DW... it'd be a tough decision.

I've only attended one "destination wedding" (in the Outer Banks of NC, which was a blast!), but most other weddings I've attended have involved travel and hotel stays.  I've always enjoyed traveling to weddings and look at it as a mini-vacation. 

You might try posting this question on the Destination Weddings board under Wedding Theme boards - I'm sure you'll get a lot more responses.

JenO24

We got married on the beach about 2 hrs from where we lived.  Even if we got married where DH and I lived, our families would have still traveled.  My family is all from PA, NJ, or NY w/ the excetion of my Mom who lives an 1hr from us, and DH family lives in the town we live in so they would have been the only ones not traveling.  We invited about 140 people, mostly older who wouldn't have been able to travel no matter where we had it, but we had a turn out of 60 which was perfect...all the people we really wanted there came...they would have come no matter where our wedding was!

We wouldnt' have changed our location at all.  The day started our rainy and dark, but around lunch it cleared up for our 4pm wedding and the rest of the day went perfectly, literally no issues! 

eabremner

I had to travel for a destination wedding last summer (I was a guest). It was really really fun (but it was a big splurge). Had it not been one of my best friends in the world, I would not have gone due to financial considerations.

It was in Virginia Beach, and while I love the beach, I would probably have preferred to go somewhere a little more exotic for what we spent. I'm not sure if you want recommendations, but in case you do,  my recommendation is to choose a destination that will wow your guests if they are going to have to spend two thousand dollars to attend (five nights hotel, airfare for 2). We could have saved a little more had we stayed fewer nights, but the couple told  us they might need our help, so we wanted to be there for them (they ended up not needing us). One fantastic thing was that everyone stayed at the same hotel, so we did almost no driving the entire weekend, which made it a really relaxing and fun beach trip. Definitely recommend that too!

It was a wonderful trip and I wouldn't trade any of it except maybe the actual location.

Congratulations and good luck!!

eabremner

I had to travel for a destination wedding last summer (I was a guest). It was really really fun (but it was a big splurge). Had it not been one of my best friends in the world, I would not have gone due to financial considerations.

It was in Virginia Beach, and while I love the beach, I would probably have preferred to go somewhere a little more exotic for what we spent. I'm not sure if you want recommendations, but in case you do,  my recommendation is to choose a destination that will wow your guests if they are going to have to spend two thousand dollars to attend (five nights hotel, airfare for 2). We could have saved a little more had we stayed fewer nights, but the couple told  us they might need our help, so we wanted to be there for them (they ended up not needing us). One fantastic thing was that everyone stayed at the same hotel, so we did almost no driving the entire weekend, which made it a really relaxing and fun beach trip. Definitely recommend that too!

It was a wonderful trip and I wouldn't trade any of it except maybe the actual location.

Congratulations and good luck!!

hannahhannah1

Hello future brides! I just got married in August, and call me a geek, but I cannot get over this stuff! So, I want to share my dos and don'ts and advise! If you have any questions for me, feel free to leave them on my blog under comments, and I will definitely get back to you!

I actually just wrote a page about DESTINATION WEDDINGS!

http://weddingdaygroundhogday.blogspot.com/2010/10/destination-weddings.html