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Cruise wedding???

jensantangelo77jensantangelo77 member
First Anniversary Name Dropper First Comment
in Destination Weddings Discussions
I am considering taking a cruise, possibly to Bahamas, and getting married in the Bahamas.  Of course we'd invite family and friends who can come on the cruise (at their own expense) but the ceremony would only really include us two and our combined 3 children.  I wanted to know thoughts about taking a cruise and getting married at one of the ports the ship docks at. 
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Re: Cruise wedding???

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    Jells2dot0Jells2dot0 mod
    First Anniversary First Answer First Comment 5 Love Its
    Glad you found the DW board!

    Just wanted to mention from an etiquette perspective that if you invite anyone on the cruise, they must also be invited to the ceremony. It would be considered inappropriate to have people spend hundreds or thousands of dollars to attend your wedding event but not actually get to attend the wedding.

    If you believe very strongly about only having your children present at the marriage, then you should not invite any guests and then possibly host a party upon your return to celebrate the recent marriage.

     







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    jensantangelo77jensantangelo77 member
    First Anniversary Name Dropper First Comment
    @Jells2dot0 - yes very true.  I wasn't sure if anyone who did a cruise destination wedding included all guests that cruised too.  I wonder if it would be better to book the ceremony on the island directly OR just go with the cruiseline wedding packages seeing that they know what all needs to be done and how to do it.  I want to save as much $$ as possible.
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    bridesontherunbridesontherun member
    5 Love Its First Anniversary Name Dropper First Comment
    Even if you book your ceremony on the cruise you can have guests come to the ceremony that don't go on the cruise. The ceremonies are booked in the chapel before you sail, your guests can all come on board. When the ceremony is over all guests not going on your cruise must exit the ship and you and your family get to sail away on a fabulous honeymoon. It seems you are looking to keep your ceremony small and intimate, but just in case I assumed incorrectly I thought I'd share my experience from cruising. (I live in a port city for the cruise lines.)
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    princessleia22princessleia22 member
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    bridesontherun said:
    Even if you book your ceremony on the cruise you can have guests come to the ceremony that don't go on the cruise. The ceremonies are booked in the chapel before you sail, your guests can all come on board. When the ceremony is over all guests not going on your cruise must exit the ship and you and your family get to sail away on a fabulous honeymoon. It seems you are looking to keep your ceremony small and intimate, but just in case I assumed incorrectly I thought I'd share my experience from cruising. (I live in a port city for the cruise lines.)

    That is true for embarkation wedding (that's what I did for my cruise wedding). That's more difficult if she wants to have wedding at one of the destination ports.  But, people could fly directly to Bahamas to attend wedding, rather than taking cruise.  

    I did embarkation wedding, not at port, so I don't have a whole lot of experience with that specifically. But, from other forums (check out wedding forum on cruisecritic.com), I've seen people have success with booking wedding through the ship directly and also booking through an independent island wedding coordinator.  It really just depends on what you are looking for.

    I agree that anyone invited on the cruise should be invited to the actual wedding ceremony. We did embarkation wedding (married before cruise leaves home port) so we could invite guests to wedding without going on cruise. Everyone was invited to both wedding & cruise. But, we had 12 guests cruise with us and 13 that came just for wedding without cruising. If you really want beach destination wedding and don't care if anyone else comes besides your kids, you can either just go with your kids and maybe have a low-key party when you get home with other family & friends, or invite others to join you for both cruise & wedding.

    image 

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    mistielove92784mistielove92784 member
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    I am getting married on a royal Caribbean cruise in the Bahamas this coming April. We have chose to do a ceremony at sea on the last day of cruising. it will actually be a devotion ceremony (due to legalities) and we will sign our papers when we are on US soil the morning after the ceremony. we decided to do it this way because we really wanted to have a cruise wedding but did not want to have people pay to go on a cruise with 2 stops and use one of those stops for our wedding. we felt if people are spending $1000+ for a vacation that it was unreasonable to take away a whole island day when there is only 2 days on islands. also the licencing on Nassau required us to be there 24 hrs. So we will be married on our full day at sea the day before we return to Florida. Our ceremony cost $1200 (includes champagne 15 professional photos boutique and boutonniere) and the reception is $64 a person (includes a private area 2 hour open bar and food). I think the dj is an extra $100.
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