Anyone got married abroad? Experiences please.

[hurricane]

Where did you go? How long did you have to be there before the ceremony? Any regrets? Thanks.

[Beksmum]

Hi Hurricane

We got married in the Dominican Republic 9.5 years ago (when it was famed for food poisoning) and it was fantastic, we had to be there a week beforehand, so had time to get a nice tan! We did go in the rainy season, but to be honest even though it rained the morning of the wedding by the time we got married in the afternoon everything just looked lovely and fresh.

We used Thomson holidays, who took care of everything and the day was perfect. There were 18 of us there in total so we found it was a good idea to let friends and family know where you were going about a year in advance so that they can save up and come too - if you want them there that is

Only one word of advice if they ask you if you want local flowers or exotic flowers, go for local as the exotic in mine were carnations not quite what i'd planned

If you chose to do it, hope you have a wonderful time. Beks

[Pinkchampagne]

I got married in Florida because neither of us wanted a big fuss, and it was lovely.

My parents had a property out there, so they went out a few months before to organise it all for us, and we turned up 5 days before the big day.

The wedding took place in Cyprus Gardens & all went well.
The weather was gorgeous, the day went well, and we enjoyed a party by the pool afterwards.

I feel this kind of wedding was right for us, but I do regret that many people close to me missed it due to not being able to get to Florida. This is my only big regret.

[Frizbe]

Yep Vegas, had to be there 3 days before, was great, would happily do it all again!! we arranged it direct with the hotel, was supposed to be thru virgin, but they'd not got their acts together at all (and have since stopped doing vegas weddings after a rash of complaints on the bbc) so we just sorted it all with the wedding people at the hotel once we got there went downtown, got our wedding licence and voila, the rest is history!

[rainypie]

Hi, we got married in the Seychelles ten years ago and it was fabulous. Our families were far apart, cornwall and essex and we lived in London so we thought it was too difficult. We paid for both sets of parents to travel with us for the wedding in the first week then they went home and we had the second week honeymoon on our own. It seemed quite expensive but big family weddings are really expensive. I would recommend having someone else there as it only takes 20 minutes and we were on the beach 1 hour before the ceremony (and half hour after!! eating wedding cake and drinking fizzy wine) great photos and great time. We had an evening reception type party a few weeks after coming home - thats when you get the pressies and get really drunk! wouldn't change a thing.