Jet Setters

If like us, you are fortunate to have friends scattered all around the world coming to your wedding, this might have an impact on your venue location decision.

For us, we decided that as the only international airport on the Riviera is Nice Airport , we wanted a venue a couple of hours drive away at the most, to make life easier for those coming from far away i.e. Australia, South Africa, North America etc To help your guests below is a list of who flies from where to Nice.

Coming from North America:
The only non stop flight to Nice is on Delta Airlines from New York JFK.
Air France flies from many US airports to Nice via Paris
British Airways flies via London
Lufthansa flies via Frankfurt
KLM flies via Amsterdam.
Emirates via Dubai

Coming from South Africa
Lufthansa flies via Frankfurt
KLM flies via Amsterdam.

Coming from Australia
Emirates via Dubai
Qantas via London
Air France via Singapore and Paris (unfortunately you also have to change airports in Paris)

Coming from Europe no-frills airlines:
EasyJet or Ryanair or from London
Air Berlin from Copenhagen, Berlin, Düsseldorf, Hamburg, London, Milan, Munich, Vienna, Zurich,

Le Beauvallon in Sainte-Maxime

This very grand palace was built in 1914, a Parisian business man asked his architect friend to build him a palace hotel in the valley, looking over the bay of St Tropez.

Le Beauvallon has 70 bedrooms so can accommodate up to 140 guests, and up to 300 guests for dinning. You can hire the place exclusively or just for the number of guests you need.

For weddings it has either a grand ballroom, with painted murals, crystal chandeliers, and a large terrace for reception drinks. Or alternatively it has the most beautiful beach club that is right on the waters edge which was just stunning and defiantly my preferred option.

Do I favour you?

Apparently we are once again following our cousins across the pound, and starting to get in to wedding favours. These are small gifts given as a gesture of appreciation or gratitude to guests from the bride and groom at the wedding reception.

There are lots of interesting ideas out there, one being the French tradition to give 5 dragées (pronounced dra-ZHAY ), whole almonds coated with a sugar shell in various colors, to each guest at their wedding. The five symbolises Health, Wealth, Happiness, Longevity, and Fertility.



Another idea, but not necessarily a tradition but still very French, is to have a box of mini macaroons at each table setting. Some of the best are made by Laduree and I can personal vouch for how lovely and yummy they are!

Also anything that is a local product to the Cote d'Azur would be appropriate.

Chateau de Massillan

I fell in love with this venue, it’s not really the French Riviera, but it is so beautiful I have to mention it. I can’t be alone in thinking this either, for when we went to visit they were already booked up for 2009. However, I should mention they only host one wedding a month. This is nice for other guests wanting to visit, but sad for moi!

The Chateau de Massillan was originally built back in 1550 as a hunting lodge. The current owners are interior designers, and you can tell as soon as you step inside.

You have to take over the whole Chateau, for a minimum of 2 nights, and they can accommodate 26 guests. So if you are looking for a magical, intermit venue for your wedding party, you might want to add this to your venue visit list.

Count Down to Wedding in Cote d'Azur

Mr and Mrs Smith

I love the Mr and Mrs Smith concept and often go to their website for inspiration and latest travel news, and have just done so and discovered they are now offering a wedding planning service. Under the find a venue France is listed, yippeee, and you can search by city wedding, country wedding or wedding with a view!!

I Do?

Do I hire a wedding planner or do I not, is the real question. The wedding industry is huge in the USA, especially in terms of dollars ($90billion). The UK is slowly following suit and people are looking more in to hiring a wedding planner. However, I have to say if my wedding was in my own country I wouldn’t even consider hiring anyone, as I feel that I could do just as good a job as them, and I know many of us look forward to the wedding planning process and take extreme joy and pride in planning every detail. But when we are talking about a wedding in a foreign country, where I don’t really speak the language, suddenly it sounds like it might be a good idea.

• They can help set up visits to potential venues
• They can save you money as they get trade rates
• They can deal in the local language
• They can make sure on the day everything goes to plan whilst you just relax and enjoy

But a deciding factor might also be about the cost. Some examples of how they charge their fees

• 10% - 15% of the overall budget
• Flat rate for day of services plus 15% of vendor contract costs
• Fee based on number of guests
• Flat rate based on amount of work needed
• Hourly Rate

So if you decide that hiring a Wedding Planner is for you make sure you:

1. Establish what their fees are and get them in writing, along with a list of the tasks that they are to be responsible for.
2. Ask the names of at least two couples whom the wedding planner has recently worked for and contact them for a reference.
3. Let your wedding planner know what your total budget is. You may wish his or her guidance at establishing how to distribute the total budget over all the items needed for the wedding.

Some local wedding planners:
http://www.eventsandhome.com/
http://www.alchimieoriginelle.com/
http://www.riviera-runners.com/
http://www.seaviewwedding.com/

However, if you feel you can find a venue you on your own in France, then great, as most of the venues have an events planner and their service is in included in to your booking, and they can do everything a wedding planner would do at no extra cost!!

Rayol-Canadel-sur-Mer /The French Riviera Garden

Is in fact two tiny villages, Le Rayol and Le Canadel which are co-joined in a single commune, located along the rugged seaside between the Saint-Tropez peninsula and Le Lavandou.

The nearest airport is Toulon approximately 50Km. I would recommend that you travel to the village via the hilltops (for those that don’t suffer from car sickness), take the RD27 road. The road is about 12 km long, and winds round the Maures national forest, and just when you are lulled into thinking the pretty broom and evergreen forests were going to stretch on forever, you are suddenly confronted by one of the Var region's most spectacular coastal panoramas, as the immense Mediterranean Sea literally explodes into view. (You might want to stop the car and get the camera out!

The area is known for the winter-blooming yellow mimosa and a couple of great little beaches.

Plage du Canadel

The sand is very fine and reasonably white and the seawater is a crystal clear, beautiful shade of light blue. There are several places to eat and drink on the beach.

The beach is easily accessible with reasonably good parking near the beach. Alternatively you can walk from the main road

Plage du Rayol

The beach consists of both pebbles and sand and is backed by pine trees, but it is nicely protected from westerly winds by the jutting Cap Nègre

It is a 10-15 minute walk down from the main road, there is not much parking but there is a place to get food.

If you don't want to just lie on the beach you should visit the Domaine du Rayol This is a large botanical garden divided into different botanical regions of the world, including of course Le Jardin de la Méditerranée. It takes about one and a half hours to follow the marked, 2 km itinerary, but you should plan on a half-day for a leisurely tour, exploration and photography. It's just a couple minutes drive down from Le Rayol, and there's parking at the entrance. Entry is 8 € adults, 5 € kids.

You might also like to check out Club Tropicana which is a Restaurant-bar-disco right on the beach. It might be nice as a possible venue for a rehearsal dinner, or if like us your wedding is running over the weekend, a party for the night the guests arrive in to town.
Club Tropicana
Plage du Canadel83820 Le Rayol Canadel
Tél. +33 (0)4 94 05 61 50

Its time to start planning

We decided to have our wedding in France as we felt its part of our story and it seemed to be calling us. (our story link to follow soon).

I had a dream of a lovely chateau in Provenance and he wanted something in the French Basque area….who would win out? Neither instead we compromised.

The French Basque area are did not really have venues that suited our needs, and on the weekend we went to the Provencal area (the exact date a year in advance), the weather was atrocious!! Whilst at a friend’s château talking about our weather worries, he suggested a lovely hotel down on the coast and told us that even when it’s bad in his area often they get slightly better weather. So we made the hours drive, and discovered our friend was right, in the last 20mins of the drive as we neared the coast the weather totally changed and the sun was shining bright.

The friend’s recommendation was the Hotel Le Baille de Suffren, which is a beautiful 4star hotel in Rayol-Canadel-sur-Mer.

We saw this on our last afternoon of our visit and had to race to the airport to catch our flight back to London, but we loved it and planned our next trip back to research the Cote d'Azur area more.

Alternative Options

If living in France before the wedding is not possible, don’t give up on your dream, just approach it from another direction.

You could instead opt to hold a civil ceremony in your home country and then hold a religious blessing or non-religious ceremony in France, either on the same day or in the days following.

You could even keep it a secret and not let your guests know about the home event, and leave all wedding related items such as the exchange of rings, vows and traditional wedding attire until the French blessing so that it is the main event in everyone’s eyes.

French Red Tape

Why wouldn’t one want to get married in one of the most romantic countries on earth, namely France? Could it be because of all the hoops and red tape they have unlike other countries.

You see, strictly speaking either the bride or groom should be resident in the area (commune) where the marriage is to take place for a period of not less than 40 days immediately before the wedding. However, there are some exceptions; if a parent of either the bride or groom are residents, or the bride and groom are part-time residents then the interpretation of the residency requirement is up to the local mayor.

You might be wondering why the mayor, well this is because in France religious marriage ceremonies are not recognized under French law. So before a priest, rabbi or any other religious official can perform a marriage ceremony, there must have been a civil ceremony first, which is held in the local town hall (marie), in front of the mayor.

Once the civil ceremony is completed, the newly weds will receive a French marriage certificate (livret de famille), and then a religious ceremony can follow in any romantic location one desires. Traditionally in France both ceremonies take place on the same day, one right after the other.

So if you have a way of meeting the 40 days resident requirement you will also need to produce:

• A valid passport or a French residence permit (carte de sejour)
• Declaration of a French home address such as a phone or utility bill
• Certified copy of birth certificates (extrait d'acte de naissance)
• Affidavit of marital status (declaration en vue de marriage
• A certificate by a French solicitor stipulating if the marriage is to include a prenuptial legal contract (contrat de marriage)
• A medical certificate, issued within the prior three months (certificat de l'examen médical prénuptial)
• One or two witnesses per spouse (témoins)

Do remember though that any documents in English must be translated into French by an officially recognized French translator...oh what joy!

Wedache: The headache you get and stress you go through while planning a wedding.

I thought I might share my frustrations and hopefully my solutions by sharing this blog about planning my May 2009 wedding in the South of France. You might wonder why I say it’s a headache, well it’s not really, however, is it just me, or does no one choose Cote d'Azur as a overseas wedding destination anymore?

France is the most beautiful country, great food, great wine, and great joie de vivre, but I have struggled to find information on the web to assist planning this joyous event, so whilst I muddle my way through finding info that is more related to the South of France rather than USA or usual Destination Weddings countries, I hope you come along for the ride.

So… enjoy, take part, leave a comment or don’t… it will all be therapeutic in the end.