We have our heart set on a ceremony venue for our 75-person wedding, with one major downside: We have to be cleaned up & off the property by 8pm. This means, I imagine, planning for dinner to end at 7. As we have many guests coming from out of state & possibly out of the country, we don't want people to feel like they have to end their evenings at this point & cut any conversations short. Initially, we were thinking of hosting an after-party at our vacation rental space where guests could continue to mingle until the later hours of the night (and we would shuttle them to their hotels).
However, I feel like we may be pressed for time if we proceed this way, even though it's more budget-conscious than hosting a traditional reception at a second venue. It seems like we'd need to have our ceremony at 1pm with a 4pm dinner (buffet-style, I imagine this taking 1.5 hours) while speeches are being given, then a cake cutting. My impression is that this may not leave very much time for the party/dancing (though I'm not sure how critical dancing is, for this group of guests).
I would appreciate any feedback on this, for brides that had the perfect venue & imperfect timeline!