White wedding

Sit back, relax, make yourself comfortable. Get a drink if you want. Are you ready, then I will begin. Once upon a time… OK, it wasn’t quite a fairytale but it was pretty damn close.
We flew out of Newcastle on Sunday afternoon down to Heathrow for our overnight flight to Johannesburg. By the time we landed in South Africa on Monday morning I was full of a cold and had barely slept on the plane over. SAA have introduced seat-back tvs on their flights now and instead of having to watch their choice of movie, you can chose from 15 or so fairly recent movies to watch whenever you want to. Everyone’s very impressed by this. So impressed that they seem to ignore the distinct lack of legroom (I felt cramped and I’m only a tiny 5′ 1" so I don’t know how normal sized people would cope. It’s like travelling on the London underground but for 12 hours. Not fun. South Africa was much as I remembered it. Two feet into the airport someone offered to push our bags around and get his brother to take us to our hotel in his (probably unlicensed) taxi. We declined and headed off to pick up our Seychelles flight tickets for the next day. The hotel we were booked into was OK (which is the nicest thing I can say about it) Expedia’s description was vastly different to our experience but it was cheap and it had a bed so I can’t complain too much. We had a look round Sandton City shopping centre, bought some sunglasses and had a nice Thai meal before heading back and sleeping. From the little I saw of Joburg, I was unimpressed and definitely won’t be hurrying back.

On Tuesday morning we were back at Joburg International for our flight to the Seychelles. The plane was half empty so once we were in the air Duncan went and sat in the row behind so we could both stretch out and sleep a little. I was still feeling full of cold though so didn’t get too much sleep. We finally landed in the Seychelles at 8pm local time and were greeted with a sauna when stepping off the plane. Apparently it was 27 degrees! We transfered to our hotel, which was lovely. Nice big room and a balcony overlooking the ocean and the St Anne Island and Marine reserve (although it was dark so couldn’t really see much). We had a late dinner and went to bed – although Duncan stayed up to watch Liverpool beat Chelsea in the Champions League.

On Wednesday we had a late breakfast before heading off to Victoria, the capital, for a look round. It’s a small town so we walked around in the baking heat before collapsing in a bar for lunch and more liquid. It was then that we discovered Duncan’s switch card had mysteriously disappeared. He’d used it in Joburg on Monday and then hadn’t used it since. He only wanted it to prove a point to me (which I was right on, but never mind) but it had gone. No idea what happened to it. We found an internet cafe and got the number to call to cancel the card, which we then did. No-one had used it thankfully and he has his new one now but it put a dampener on the day. We didn’t really need it in the Seychelles, we had cash already and we could survive in SA without it cos Duncan still had some money in bank accounts over there but it’s been a right pain not having it over here. We’ve had to use some of the money we received as presents from Duncan’s family to pay for things like the DJ on Saturday (cos I’m pretty broke this month). Anyway, we cancelled the card and then went back to the hotel to get our transfer to the airport for our flight to Praslin, where we were staying for the rest of the week. I was horrified at the airport to learn that the flight would be in a 30-seater propellor plane. I’ve never been in such a small plane before and I couldn’t concentrate on the gorgeous scenery because I was intensely watching the propellors to make sure they were still going and worrying about the lightening up ahead, hoping it wouldn’t hit us. It was, thankfully, only a 15-minute flight followed by a 20 minute bus journey along the twisty coastal road of Praslin to our hotel. We finally got there just before 5pm.

I cannot recommend enough the hotel we stayed in (The Black Parrot Suites on Praslin). We arrived hot, tired and a little travelsick and were greeted with ice cold flannels and fruit juice. We had a meeting with our wedding planners straight away and it took about 30 minutes to sort everything out. We were then taken to our room. In all the guide books I’d read about the Seychelles, they always said that 5 star hotels in the Seychelles would translate as 3 star in the Western world. This meant our 4 star hotel should have been maybe a 2 star. Rubbish. A large room, with a four-poster bed, seating area and a private balcony overlooking the Indian Ocean are definitely not 2 stars. The whole hotel was fabulous although it made me wonder what on earth the more expensive hotels could have to offer over and above this. There were only 12 rooms in the hotel, all couples, so it was our first proper, grown-up, have-to-get-dressed-up-for-dinner holiday.

We spent Thursday relaxing around the pool and trying not to get too sunburnt. (Duncan failed here, he has quite a red face in the photos!) Friday dawned and was hot but a bit overcast. I was a little bit worried but for no reason, it soon became very sunny. We spent the morning relaxing and trying not to be too nervous about the afternoon. At just after 3pm, Duncan left to get changed (they organised a room for him) and I was left to get ready on my own, which is when the nerves kicked in. In the space of about 30 seconds I went from feeling fine to feeling like I was going to be very, very sick. I got ready and waited for Fadette (travel rep) to come and zip my dress up and then her and Phillip (hotel’s wedding co-ordinator) walked me down to Fisherman’s Wharf, where the ceremony was taking place. I met the photographer and had a couple of photos taken before walking down the jetty to REM’s At My Most Beautiful. By the time I got to Duncan, my stomach was in knots and I was so nervous I wasn’t even sure I could speak! The ceremony was short but perfect. We said our vows before exchanging rings and signing the register. We then had photos taken and drank sparkling wine (a gift from the travel company) and ate cake. We had a two-tier cake and managed to eat half the bottom tier over the rest of the holiday. We took the top tier to South Africa and gave the rest to the staff. We had loads of photos taken which took about 90 minutes in all and then went back to the hotel. In the evening, they set up a table for us away from the rest of the guests and we had dinner alone and another bottle of sparkling wine from the hotel. After dinner we went back to the room and… Well, you don’t need to know the rest!!

The last three days in the Seychelles were spent exploring a little bit. On Saturday we went on a little walk that last 90 minutes. I maintain it was the map’s fault for two reasons. One, the scale was non-existant. It placed our hotel and the hotel next door a little way apart, so I used that as a scale and figured the walk wouldn’t be too bad. Two, it utterly failed to mention the two massive hills en route. By the time we got to Baie St Anne, the largest settlement on Praslin, we were utterly knackered and totally sunburnt. To cap it off, there was nothing to do in the village so we stayed about 20 minutes before managing to get a taxi back. We spent the rest of the day nursing our sunburn.On Sunday we planned our trip to La Digue on Monday, organising boats and taxis. We spent most of Monday on La Digue, the third most populated island in the Seychelles, and visited some of the early settlements. We walked loads as well (very few cars on the island) so were pretty shattered. We managed to grab an early night as we had to get up at 4:30am on Tuesday to catch our 6:30 flight back to Mahe and then our connecting flight to Johannesburg. On the way we collected our wedding photos and certificate.

Following our flights from Praslin to Mahe, Mahe to Joburg and then Joburg to East London, we finally touched down in East London at 5pm on Tuesday evening, where Duncan’s mum met us at the airport. It had been a long day so after a nice dinner, we pretty much went to bed. On Wednesday & Thursday we sorted out a few of Duncan’s things including his driving license and how to get his money out of the country without being utterly stiffed on taxes by both governments. (It took 5 days to sort this out, a lot of pleading with bank managers and we still haven’t got all of it)

On Friday, Barbara (Duncan’s mum) had paid for us to go on a game drive in a private reserve along the coast. This was fantastic. We saw lions, zebras, ostriches and rhinos all very close up and got some great pics. On Saturday, all of Duncan’s family descended on his mum’s house for the evening to celebrate our wedding. Barbara spent pretty much all day cooking and wouldn’t let me help at all. The evening was great, not spoiled by the incessant rain at all. Sunday and Monday were spent relaxing and packing in preparation for our flights home on Monday afternoon. The three of us (me, Duncan and Barbara) left East London on Monday afternoon and finally arrived in Newcastle on Tuesday lunchtime. We spent the rest of the week trying to relax and sort out the reception as well as help Duncan’s mum plan her stay in the UK. She’s off to York later this week and Edinburgh for a couple of days as well. She was planning on going to London, but I think she’s changed her mind, I don’t think she feels brave enough (and who can blame her?)

Saturday just gone was the UK reception and a fab night it was too. We had about 70 odd people, including sapphire and blueberrymarcus, most of which was my family who I hadn’t seen in at least ten years. Some of them, such as my cousin Debbie, hadn’t changed at all. It was a great night, lots of dancing, drinks and photos. We got home around 2am and had to get up early on Sunday to cook food for my mum, step dad and sisters coming to visit for lunch. Getting up this morning for work was possibly the hardest thing I’ve done in ages but I can tell, it wasn’t long until I began to feel like I’d never been away. Now all I need is sleep.

*edited to say, yes, there will be pics. I need to sort them out this week and will hopefully have them ready to show to the world by the weekend.*

Until there is a next time…

The new Mrs Lincoln xx