Destination Wedding: St. Augustine, Florida
I know I put this blog off for a week, but trust me, I didn't want to deliver a poor quality post and you didn't want to hear me ramble. So finally, I'm getting around to recapping our trip.
Jeff and I took a trip to St. Augustine, Florida from June 11 - June 14, 2009 to watch one of my closest friends, Meghan Hokom wed Mark Stapleton. Here's our trip in a nutshell - a very LARGE nutshell.
Jeff and I flew out early (early, early) morning last Thursday. I booked us on AirTran, because at the time, it was the cheapest way to get us from point A to C (via B of course). AirTran is based out of Atlanta. And if there is one airport I never want to see again, it's Atlanta. To start, the place is huge. But I think my distaste mostly comes from the 5 hour layover we spent there on our way to Jacksonville.
Finally, after a thankfully brief 1 hour flight, we arrived in Jacksonville. This was the closest airport to fly into as St. Augustine was only about a 1 hour drive south. While Jeff battled the conveyor belts to get our baggage (which we ended up forking over about $130/total in baggage check fees) I went to go get our rental car. I reserved a mid-size car, which online said was similar to a Mazda 6 - fair enough, I thought. Four doors, not too big and economical in price. But do you think Jeff and I got a Mazda 6? Of course not. Instead, we pimped out the following:
A Chevy HHR. Otherwise known as ghetto fabulous. If any of my friends or family drive one of these, I wish I could apologize for my dislike. But I can't. Aside from it's overall look, it's pretty much plastic on wheels. After a good laugh on both Jeff and my part, we decided to make the most of it and try to look as cool as possible. We probably failed.
We took the scenic route out of Jacksonville and rode down AIA (Beach Front Avenue!!) all the way in to St. Augustine and ended up arriving around 5pm. Just in time to check into the hotel and refresh ourselves for dinner. We headed to AIA Alehouse in downtown St. Augustine to dine with Meghan, Mark and her family along with the Tye's. Jeff sampled the beer and, what has now become a Koenig tradition, we bought a pint glass to add to our collection at home.
Afterwards, Meghan organized a 'Girls Night' in Jacksonville that included a lot of her friends from the school she used to teach at when she lived there. The night was pretty humid, but we made the most of it, bought Meghan plenty of rounds and ended up dancing at some small joint by the end of the night. A pretty fun night, but after a late night run to Krystal's (barf), I was running on 23 hours without sleep and pretty desparate to get back to the hotel.
Jeff was sympathetic the next morning and let me sleep in a bit. Friday was our chill day. We decided to explore downtown St. Augustine which has a lot of historical landmarks. Including El Castillo de San Marcos, which we did not end up taking a tour of. After spending the morning exploring and taking plenty of pictures, we decided to go to the beach.
If you know me, you're probably aware of the fact that I am NOT a beach person. It probably is due 60% to the fact that I have to stuff myself into spandex/lycra to enjoy it and the other 40% I attribute to sand (not a fan) and humidity (also, not a huge fan). But I was pretty cas (as in short for casual) about the whole thing this time and we went down there not caring if we scared anybody off the beach with our white skin and farmers tans. The water was FREEZING (not expected) but once we dunked ourselves in we got used to it. I have to say, the Atlantic ocean is so different from the Gulf. MUCH cleaner. While the water wasn't crystal clear, I still didn't have seaweed or manwar grasping at my legs like you do on the Texas coastline.
We returned to our rooms, beet red from lack of sunscreen (stupid, I know!!) and got ready for the rehersal dinner that night. The event was held at The Reef restaurant and had a great view of the ocean, awesome mojitos and a killer stuffed chicken breast.
The next day was wedding day!! Jeff and I were crazy and woke up super early to catch some pics of sunrise. Watching it on a semi-deserted beach, when temperatures were cool and people were out walking their pups really made me appreciate the beach life. I could totally go for it if temperatures were like that all the time. Of course, by 10am, I had changed my mind. Jeff had left to go golfing with the men at the World Golf Village course, which is apparently some big deal, but Jeff appreciated it way more than me and was excited to go, which made me excited for him.
Meanwhile, back at the hotel things were starting to get busy. At noon, the hair and makeup lady showed up and I was first on the schedule. Things were progressing relatively smoothly for a wedding day except for the fact that Desmond (Mark & Meghan's son) was so very sick. Poor baby was running a 102.7 degree fever and the bride was starting to freak out. Luckily they were able to get some antibiotics for him, but the poor guy just wanted to be held for most of the day.
By 7:15pm, we all caravaned down to Anastasia State Park where the ceremony was held. Thankfully(though, not at the time), 2 hours prior to the event there was a HUGE downpour, which ended up cooling temperatures by 15-20 degrees. And, the best part? It provided the perfect backdrop to any wedding - a rainbow! The bride was beautiful and walked down the aisle with her son, and was met halfway by her Dad. Too cute!
Everything went beautifully during the ceremony and then afterwards we were probably half way through the photos when it started to RAIN! Not hard, but enough to scare away most of the wedding guests and concern the photographer because of his gear. They snapped a few more but then it was time to call it a wrap!
On to the reception! Originally the reception was to be held on the patio, but because of the showers, they had to move everything indoors. It was still beautiful, if not cozy! The cake was gorgeous, the meal superb and the guitarist was amazing (too bad he's not for hire in Texas). Meghan and Mark got to share a first dance and Mark's dad, Desmond (yes, the name is popular in his family) gave a nice toast. All-in-all a beautiful event!
We shared a drink with the newlyweds and some of their friends at a bar afterwards, but could only make it through one drink before we tired out. We had to get packed since we were headed out in the morning.
Sunday dawned and Jeff and I loaded up our hoopty-ride and headed out of St. Augustine around 7:30am. One last stop to take a pic of the lighthouse (which apparently is haunted, though we missed this tour as well). It was a smooth transaction returning our rental car and we actually ended up getting to our gate a little early, which meant, of course, more time to WAIT. *sigh*
We had another lenghty layover on the way back (4 hours) but made it back to good 'ole San Antone by 5:30. We were exhausted and sick of traveling (I think the layovers did us in).
But we had a great trip and were so excited to see Meghan married. Destination weddings are so much fun. And I encourage any friends or family members who plan a wedding in the future to go this route!
Picture Jeff and I holding a cardboard sign that reads:
We'll Travel For Weddings.
I organized each event into sets which can be viewed on the right side of my Flickr page.
2 Comments:
GREAT review! :) I love that place! Beautiful! Glad you had fun!
This was the a great recap of your vacation! Thanks again for coming over and being such a big part of our wedding.
Love you girl!
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