We seriously considered it, but thought of going o/s to do so.
We decided against it as the more we looked into it, we knew as Satya said
(1) family would get upset
(2) if we did tell them we knew that some of them would want to come too!
We ended up having a smallish informal outdoor wedding insted.
Yep, the Bear & I eloped in December 2006. We hadn't been together very long (6-7 months), so no-one was really expecting it. We told absolutely no-one. We were going on a round the world trip anyway, and our first stop was San Francisco. We took a side trip to Vegas and got married in a brand new bright red Ford Mustang convertible which we hired for the few days we were there (the Bear wanted to bring the car home!). Everyone was great about it after the fact (what choice do they really have anyway?) my mum was briefly disappointed but she has never been particularly involved in my life so she didn't harp on it much. My stepmum (who I'm very close to) was disappointed cause she would have loved to be involved in my wedding. My dad was completely ecstatic because as far as he was concerned it saved him shelling out $50K for a wedding (which I would never have asked him to do BTW). My brother was the most shocked, we had seen him in Australia at Christmas, met him a week later in Spain and had got married in the meantime. The Bear had been married before so his family didn't make a fuss about it.
As to cost, apart from the flight (from memory around $2500 ish which was pretty standard then for a RTW ticket I think) and the car hire the costs were:
Licence USD$55
Wedding chapel USD $45
Tip for minister USD $60 (discretionary)
Cheapest wedding in history! Because we spent so little on the wedding itself, we could afford to stay in nice places in the States, Spain, Switzerland, England and Thailand over the course of the trip. We arrived in Vegas at 5 in the afternoon on the day we got married and didn't start 'organising' the wedding until we got to the hotel room, we were married by 7.30pm.
For us it was great - it was completely intimate, there was no big hoopla, no sense of pressure, no one else's expectations to manage. We were parked outside the Wedding License Bureau and we looked at each other and said "are we going to do this?". We could have just driven away and laughed about it, no one would have known anything about it, so there was absolutely no sense of pressure. We both agreed we would go ahead and do it, and we have never regretted it for a second!
I have a few friends who have eloped in Australia and have found that to be great too.
Good luck with whatever you decide!
I want to elope but DP won't hear of it! He has a big family and they all would be cranky with us whereas my large family are all weddinged out! I have had two friends elope, one to Port Douglas and another to Cairns and they both loved it!
DP and I are eloping at the end of November in Australia. We have told some family so its not really eloping as I wanted tot run things by them and so it wouldnt be such a shock. At first they said they would be sad not to see us say our vows but they know it is what will make us happy. I come from a family where everyone is divorced same as DP so I couldnt imagine anyhting worse than them all in the same room.
We are getting married up at Coffs Harbour. PM me if youwant some more details. We got a great packeage and they have a website if you want some more info.
lol eloped sounds so naughty
But DH and i decided to just have a Registry Wedding. You just have to apply to be married, then wait 1 month and 1 day and then you can be married. You have to book it with them of course and need whitnesses.. but you dont have to invite anyone else if you dont want to. We just invited family. Was a nice little ceremony and just what we wanted.
But my brother and his wife were married in the cook islands. They just had my parents there and my bros best mate.
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