“Some of the most memorable honeymoons,” according to K.C. DAVID, author of The Complete Guide to Gay and Lesbian Weddings, “have been spent entirely in a hotel room.” Not in a Hawaiian monastery run by Buddhist nuns, though, would be my guess. Even if it doubles as a bed and breakfast, it is probably not a honeymoon hot-spot. Meditation. Futons. Separate sleeping quarters. Nope. Definitely not. But the islands sound intriguing and you can always go chain hotel at whatever stage of luxury you can afford (or feel like going into debt for as some people do). Now that the wedding is planned and details are checked and crossed off the to do list, talk turns to the honeymoon. The initial plan was St Maarten / St Martin and the timeshare there in September but the summer is already crammed full and kindergarten looms, so even with the lure of a nude beach on the French side of the island, practicality dictates a much further delayed post nuptial trip.
Hawaii initially came up when Rob pointed out that traveling to the Caribbean is not something that Western Canadians usually do because the distance makes the traveling quite expensive. What was more typical was Hawaii. So, a quick google search of hotels and packages one afternoon revealed the usual suspects of chain hotels and postcard friendly vacations that though they looked very nice….were well…very nice. However there is nothing particularly memorable about a hotel that could be anywhere once you were ensconced inside its walls. Another web sweep of b & b’s netted the Buddhist option.
I began to think about the honeymoon trips of people that I know and I realized that the first thing that you need to do is establish a vision for the trip. Or at the very least a purpose. And I know what you are thinking, the purpose of a honeymoon needs no explanation to anyone, but that is when you are working from the assumption that everyone who takes the time to honeymoon (not a verb, I know) is working from the same paradigm. I mean, even my husband to be wants to see more of Hawaii than the inside of a hotel room.
My best friend and her husband went to New York City for their honeymoon. They moved at the speed of sound while they were there, took in every sight and even managed to get on to the segment of the Today Show where people brand themselves tourists by standing behind Al Roker with signs that read “Just Married” which in their case was true, but they had been together for several years, had a child and shared living quarters. Their honeymoon doubled as a vacation. My sister and her SO of fifteen years tied the knot the year after Will and I married. They rented a cabin in the Wisconsin Dells. They never saw the outside of the cabin as the birth of my nephew exactly nine months later can attest. My parents stayed at my dad’s Aunt Anne’s in Detroit one of the first nights of their marriage. They were on their way to Niagara Falls. Give my Dad points for being romantic and then subtract them for being too cheap to spring for another night’s stay in a hotel instead of asking my Mom to spend the night with total strangers. They bunked in an attic bedroom. The fact that she can remember where the room was located and Dad doesn’t even remember stopping there, speaks loudly to the romanticism of the memory and very different expectations.
Will and I drove to Colorado. It was part vacation but it was also a way for him to show me some of the places that were important to him. The zoo in Colorado Springs and Pike’s Peak. By accident I discovered the hotel in Estes Park where Stephen King began writing what would become The Shining. King was Will’s favorite author. Despite being ten years younger than I am, I rarely saw any child-like enthusiasm from him whereas I could summon my inner child with ease in most situations. He was like a kid in a candy store when we stayed at The Stanley. I had to take pictures of everything. Him holding the mug King drank from and autographed. The infamous fire hoses hanging in the hall. The room where King stayed.
Rob’s honeymoon with Shelley had a similar theme. He took her back to Ontario where he is originally from to show her the places that are a part of who he is. Together they visited one of his childhood homes where he managed to creep out the current owner by taking pictures of the residence without ever introducing himself. He managed to underwhelm his new bride with a side trip into the woods to show her an old homestead where his father had liberated field stones from to build a fireplace in one of the many homes he grew up in. But my favorite of Rob’s honeymoon stories is the night he abandoned Shelley to their tent and crosswords to make acquaintance with campsite neighbors and drink their beer. I don’t think he even made it back to the tent that night; combine that with the story he told me about their first house warming party (an anecdote for another day) and I think Shelley is someone who could have taught even me patience.
Honeymoons, at least in the U.S., are a $12 billion dollar a year industry. 99% of couples who have a traditional wedding will follow it immediately with a honeymoon trip. Honeymoons account for 14% of the wedding budget and the average cost is $3,700 with the typical trip running about 8 days. I am not sure Rob and I fall into the average or even typical range although I was assured by a U.S. customs official this last Monday that Internet/LDR couples are becoming very typical for them. I doubt that we will have the typical honeymoon even if we do something as cliche as Hawaii. As likely as we are to spend a generous amount of time indoors, we are both enjoy exploring and being physical in the less than typical honeymoon way. And as he is coming up on nearly 27 years older and wiser, I don’t think I will be losing my groom to the neighbors no matter how much beer they have in their cooler. Although Rob assures me this would depend on the type of beer.
