help me find my destination wedding location?

[sweetpea&babycorn]

hi everyone! after toying with the idea of a destination wedding with my fiance, we have decided to make it official and start planning our destination wedding!

we were initially going to have a traditional local wedding, but there has been so much frustrating family drama on my side that i really could care less if my extended family went to my wedding. plus, my parents also wouldn''t really like to deal with the headache of being polite to them since they all tend to complain about everything, criticize, and just generally act ungratefully. my fiance and i were only planning a local wedding to be respectful to my dad mostly, since he has sort of become the "head'' of our large family (i''m chinese, so this whole family dynamic thing is a little hard to explain).

but anyway, i decided to be brave and tell my mom that with our budget and large guest list, having a local wedding is going to be very difficult, and i have already had a hard time trying to find the right venue. i was also having a harder time swallowing the idea of paying all this money for people to be at my wedding who i frankly don''t want at my wedding. to my surprise, my mom was SO relieved and thinks a destination wedding would be a fabulous idea, so i need your ladies'' (and guys'') help please!

i first need to find a location (right?) and a date. we''re pretty sure we will have to bump our wedding to July 2011 instead of June 2011 in order for my dad and some of my wedding party to take time off and try to make a vacation out of our wedding.

so FINALLY, my question for all of you would be: do you have any location suggestions for a mid-summer wedding? i can''t get married where it will be too humid (hot is ok) since my skin is super sensitive and heat rash + wedding dress does not equal beautiful happy bride. we would prefer to get married near the ocean but could deal if that''s not possible. we were thinking somewhere in europe... i would love to get married on the mediterranean coast, but i think it may be too humid? i remember the 2000 olympic games in athens where people could not stand the heat.

so any suggestions, sock it to me thanks for any help!

 

[Amzizzle]

I live in Orlando,Fl and almost had a destination wedding.It can be humid here,but people love getting married in the Keys or Amelia Island (It is so beautiful). If possible October and November are great months down here.I am getting married in November (It''s outside of hurricane season).

If you want something more exotic why not Tuscany,Scotland,or Ireland. You can''t beat the scenery.I''m sure in most of these places you could find times of year that work for you.

I think Giuliana and Bill (she is an E! host) were married in Italy and the weather looked great on the TV special (no sweating,bad makeup,etc.)I''m sure you could google and see what time of year they got married.

Ok,so I threw out a lot of ideas lol.I hope it helps,and good luck!

 

[RaiKai]

You might want to even look at resorts on the West Coast of Canada, on Vancouver Island. It is beautiful there in the summer, and many of the resorts are on the ocean. It's warm, but should not be stifling! We actually had our own destination wedding at one of them (in the winter, so cooler, but there was no snow, it was green, and it was absolutely beautiful).

If you are open to going outside of the ocean box, you can look at places like Banff National Park, Lake Louise, Jasper National Park, Waterton Lakes National Park (all in Alberta, Canada). They all have beautiful lovely well-known hotels (such as the Prince of Wales, etc) overlooking beautiful mountains and mountain lakes (which are amazing blue and green colours).

Here is a link to some info on Banff/Lake Louise for example:


Banff Lake Louise

And here is a wonderful pic of one of the lakes at Banff:


Pic of Moraine Lake in Banff

All would have wonderful weather at that time of the year!

 

[havernell]

In the same spirit of RaiKai's Canada suggestions, in July I would think the coast of Maine or the islands off the coast of Washington State (like the San Jaun Islands) or the Oregon coast would be good choices. Or even somewhere on a lake in the Adirondacks or Catskills in Upstate NY or Vermont would be lovely (lots of cute bed and breakfasts there that could host a small wedding).

I guess what I'm trying to say is that destination wedding does not have to equal international. There are plenty of beautiful areas of the US that are at their best in the summer!

 

[Nov2109]

What about Alaska? The views there are gorgeous, it will be on the cooler side, but not too cold and you could still have your ocean wedding. Ive been there once, but not in years. That is if you wanted to stay in the states(im assuming you are in the states?) Northern California? So many places to choose from, the northeast CT, RI, MA and upwards also has relatively low humidity, you just have to be careful as that is hurricane season.

Ireland would be my top choice of a non caribbean destination.

 

[sweetpea&babycorn]

thanks for the suggestions everyone! these are great ideas. i live in vermont and grew up in new england, so i could love a change of scenery. washington state sounds wonderful, and alaska would be great! how hot is it there in july? i was talking to my boss today who is more excited than i am about our destination wedding. he suggested the azores way off the coast of portugal... has anyone heard of these islands? apparently they have direct flights from boston logan airport to the islands. anyway, we will keep scouring for places, i am so excited!!

 

[Pushin40]

hi Sweetpea&babycorn!

We decided (and booked) a destination wedding. Before we chose Mexico, I was completey overwhelmed. WAY too many islands, WAY too many hotel choices. I ended up using this company I found on line - they are travel agents/wedding planners and they really helped us make up our minds.
Here is the link:
http://www.destinationweddings.com/

They assign you a wedding coordinator, you set up a call with her, tell her your vision, then she starts emailing optiosn to you. I cannot recommend them any stronger. Please check them out (they are actually located in MA, where I live.) You can do everything in Email too.

The best part is, this service is FREE. They do require a $50 deposit but that gets applied to your trip when you book it with them. They were also able to provide a lower rate for the hotel we chose, than anything I could find on line. You can also refer all of your guests to them and twill book their air and hotel as well.

I don't know what I would have done without them!

Check out the website - you can do a lot of planning on the site too.

Oh - and if you want beach-y, and it has to be in the summer - I say Aruba or Cabo San Lucas since both places only get 3 inches of rain a year. OR....do it in the late winter orspring and go to any island for nice weather.

Good luck!

(PS - we have a camp on Lake Willoughby - do you know where that is??)

 

[Nov2109]

as long as you don''t go to the northern section, in July the temperature ranges from 60-75.

It all really depends on what you want and your budget!

 

[shertz1981]

Oooh, how exciting!

The Maritimes are lovely, IMO ... maybe Nova Scotia? How about Prince Edward Island? (For the latter, I''d definitely go more toward Summerside, to try to get away from the Anne of Green Gables hoopla.)

Maine also has some amazing beaches.

Ireland could be amazing, and isn''t a bad trip from the East Coast. Or how about Iceland? Only 4 hours by plane from Boston.

 

[sweetpea&babycorn]

great suggestions, thank you! sorry for my delay in responding, too much stuff going on and thinking about.

i had no idea how stressful it could be to just decide on a place to get married. my fiance and i got into a squabble which wound up involving my mother and 2 sisters (one is the MOH and the other is a BM). basically, i don''t work well when there are too many options to choose from. i am notoriously slow and indecisive whenever we go to a restaurant to eat. imagine all the possibilities for a wedding! so i spent a while throwing out some ideas to my fiance and he gave the thumbs down on all of them. basically, there are about 25 or so of his family and friends that he absolutely wants at the wedding. because of that, i told him to pick a place for us. mostly because i was frustrated with him turning down all my ideas. he picked virginia... i initially thought virginia beach - nice, tropical-ish, and definitely destination for my family, but not his. it''s affordable to travel there, great! then fiance changes his mind and decides virginia beach is too touristy. now he wants to get married on his grandmother''s farm...

as much as i love his family and understand the sentimentality of getting married on his grandmother''s farm... i didn''t sign up for a destination wedding on a farm. someone out there please tell me there is an alternative in virginia that doesn''t involve a farm!

am i overreacting about the farm thing? it''s not quite where i envisioned myself getting married, but at this point i''m not sure if i am allowed to be too picky since the whole DW idea was to get away from my family, which puts a strain on some of his family to travel (a small portion, most live in VA and NC)

 

[PumpkinPie]

I live in Alberta and come from the east coast of Canada so I ditto all Canadian suggestions - either coast or in the Rockies would be fabulous!

 

[PumpkinPie]

oops - missed the new farm `destination` development. I`m afraid I don`t know much about Viriginia - sorry!

 

[sonnyjane]

Ouch..farm huh? Well, I''ll say this - I know it''s not every woman''s idea of the perfect location, but I can envision some absolutely amazing wedding photos on a farm! I''d at least do a site visit and see if there''s anything you can work with, but the venue definitely has potential if that''s what he''s set on.

 

[Deelight]

A farm could be stunning - the location is what you make of it think a beautiful marquee with lanterns hanging and fairy lights in the trees photo''s in hay bales and a balmy beautiful summer night under the stars, a beautiful band playing so much potential - you could a rustic elegance theme

I was going to suggest Australia as a destination we have some amazing tropical beaches and the weather in June/July is winter and just perfect wedding weather warm but not to cold or hot

 

[sweetpea&babycorn]

Date: 4/6/2010 4:32:02 AM
Author: Deelight
A farm could be stunning - the location is what you make of it think a beautiful marquee with lanterns hanging and fairy lights in the trees photo''s in hay bales and a balmy beautiful summer night under the stars, a beautiful band playing so much potential - you could a rustic elegance theme

I was going to suggest Australia as a destination we have some amazing tropical beaches and the weather in June/July is winter and just perfect wedding weather warm but not to cold or hot

thanks all. i''m glad that not everyone is poking me forks about being picky and being not-so into a farm wedding. i have seen some pictures of his grandmother''s farm, and it looks like a farm run by an almost 90-year old woman. it looks EXTREMELY rustic.

Deelight, thanks for providing some optimism about this potential venue. i do love the idea of rusty elegance with lots of lights, candles, etc. i could discuss this with my fiance.

i''m trying not to rain on my own parade, but i formulated a lot of challenges with this farm, and hope my fiance will listen to my concerns. please tell me what you think.

if we went with the farm, my fiance''s uncle''s sister could cater the wedding. but she can only cook the food. so we''d get the tent, tables, chairs, linens, and china through another company. but we can''t afford to pay for a setup crew and cleanup crew on top of a bartender and servers. so fiance said that his family could do all the setup and clean up. we''ve been together for almost 6 years, and ive seen how his family deals with large events. it''s mostly disorganized, almost always delayed (by SEVERAL hours), and just overall a lot to ask (we''re expecting around 100 guests to attend). Plus, i really don''t want his parents to miss out on our day because they are setting everything up.

another issue is lodging for the guests... his farm is in this small tiny isolated town with ONE motel nearby. i''m not sure how big this motel is, but with our wedding party and guests from out of town, i would imagine that we would need at least 20 rooms. there is enough room on the farm for maybe 10 guests to stay in.

i''ve been looking at the cavalier hotel in virgina beach, but the reception coordinator guy seems very stand-offish, at least by email. he''s not very helpful. so i''m exploring other options. anyone from virginia or familiar with virginia that can offer some solutions to this seemingly never-ending predicament?

 

[Nov2109]

The farm sounds nice, especially because it is "rustic" looking...however

I was thinking this might be your out! Is the farm near the beach? If so, VA does get hit with hurricanes, its one thing if that''s where you are from and there is nothing you can do about possibly getting struck with a hurricane, but why have your "destination" wedding where that threat is a possibility!

Also, VA is VERY humid in the summer...its 90 degrees in NJ today, hot and humid!