Destination Wedding Traveling

I think you're already going above and beyond! I don't think Transportation is your responsibility - it is a nice to have, but when I travel, I expect to figure out my own transportation. No way do I think you should be paying everyone's Uber expenses - they should factor that into their costs when determining if they can afford the trip or not.

Guests should be able to figure out rides on their own.

I agree that you're already going above and beyond! I've had to travel for a couple of weddings and the only things I expect is the food and drinks at the wedding itself are covered and a reasonably-priced hotel room block.

You’re being a very generous host. We did provide a shuttle from our venue/the hotel where most of our guests stayed to and from the rehearsal dinner/welcome party. You might consider doing that—some of our guests chose to drive themselves but most used the shuttle, even a few who were staying at different hotels. How many different hotels do you have guests at? And how far is the rehearsal dinner from those hotels?

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I agree with this!

View Quoted Comment The rehearsal dinner spot is 15 minutes away from the cluster of hotels. Unfortunately our hotel is about 45 from the ceremony location but we thought that was being reasonable.

You are doing plenty so I would leave it up to them to figure out transportation.

View Quoted Comment Is there a large gap between your ceremony and reception? I might be missing something but I don’t understand how/why you’d definitely provide transportation to the reception but only potentially the ceremony.


I think you are being a wonderful host with the meals, but I personally would rather pay for my own lunch before the wedding if I knew I didn’t have to rent a car. Car rental rates have skyrocketed recently and availability is down across the country. I would recommend reallocating budget to work with a transportation company so my guests were chauffeured to all events. I don’t think it makes you a bad hostess if you don’t, but I think it’s the right gesture!

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@There is a large gap (4 hours) due to the ceremony being an hour away. We will be taking photos elsewhere and since it's in the desert we wanted to give people ample time to change/freshen up while we took our photos. Our guests are aware of this and we mentioned our initial plan was for reception only to give people an opportunity to explore the area prior to the reception occurring. We received our quote back for the passenger bus and it is better than we anticipated so we will probably just explore that route for the day of.

In my opinion, we can not be expected to chauffer our guests to the welcome lunch and rehearsal dinner. Both are 15 minutes from the respective hotels which we think is reasonable and quite honestly, we hope there isn't the expectation for us to shuttle people for those two events. Am I wrong for thinking that?

HI there! You're definitely responsible for guests from the start of the ceremony to the end of the reception, because that's the part you're hosting. I think for all other events it's reasonable to expect them to sort out their own transportation. As a guest, I would expect to take a cab or uber to the venue for the lunch and rehearsal dinner.

Because your ceremony is so far from the hotel and reception - and the gap - I’d try to provide transportation from the hotel to ceremony, ceremony to reception and depending where the reception is, transportation back to the hotel. A 15 min Uber is no big deal for rehearsal dinners and other events but 45 mins to the ceremony and then an hour to the reception is pretty far for out of town guests. Obviously totally not required but sounds like it’s be appreciated and appropriate. Rental cars are pretty expensive these days.

As a guest, I would expect to plan out my own transportation - you're already doing so much! I would be grateful for what you've set up and handle the transportation!

I don’t think you are expected to pay for their rental car or Uber. I am also having a destination wedding and all my guests that are coming either know they will be getting an Uber or others have already rented rental cars if they are making it a family vacation and attending our wedding.

I was with everyone who said you don't need to provide transportation for your guests at any point throughout the weekend, but now I see the additional details you provided about the very long gap between ceremony and reception and the distances between. Unless everyone rents their own cars, this will be very inconvenient for guests on your wedding day. I would try really hard to make the logistics of that day easier for your guest somehow (e.g., closing the gap, switching locations, and/or providing transportation to and from).

As far as rental cars or other transportation guests usually provide for themselves, I keep hearing about the shortage of rental cars and how much more expensive they are than in years past. Same for Lyft/Uber (which are always highly location-dependent for availability and pricing). Maybe your guests are reacting to those issues as they research travel options, and that's why you're getting the feedback. I would try to help ease these issues as much as you can.

View Quoted Comment We are deciding to provide additional transportation to the ceremony (there and back) as well as to the reception. I don’t not personally believe we should be expected to provide any additional on the day before or after

Your guests may be reacting to the nationwide shortage and price hike of rental cars which has been happening for the past few months. My husband and I recently decided to cancel our summer vacation after we learned that a rental car would be more expensive than our flights and lodging combined!

Since you're having a true destination wedding, I would definitely provide all transportation to and from the ceremony and reception. I don't think it's unreasonable to expect guests to get themselves to the other events (i.e. via Uber/Lyft) since they're only 15 minutes away.

I think the more important question is how far is the trip is between the airport and the hotels that your guests are staying at, because this would determine if they'd truly need rental cars or not to get to the hotels, and if they could get away doing those trips via Uber/Lyft. I would personally be very hesitant to attend a destination wedding any time soon if I knew I needed to book a rental car, simply because I wouldn't be sure that I'd be able to afford this added cost, which may very well be even more than the flights and/or hotel cost. But of course, that depends on location and hopefully things we be back to normal by your wedding in October!