Wedding trip – Jason likes to travel

A wedding in Washington: Idaho, Utah and a second wedding!

Hello dear readers! How are things? Onwards to the next of the wedding blogposts!

Alright, let me preface this by saying that perhaps I didn’t entirely think through the name of this series when I started out. “A wedding in Washington” kind of starts falling apart when you’re then talking about weddings in Utah so yeah, I didn’t entirely think that one through.

In my defence this series was originally drafted as one singular blog post called: “Six weeks, four states, two weddings” which is a much more accurate representation of the trip but really, one blog post? I have a tendency to ramble on a bit and get side-tracked so one post would have been far too long – of course you regular readers know this already.

Anyway, anyone who has been following the wedding series will know that last time out I wrapped up my final week in Washington by not actually leaving Washington. It’s a long old story and it’s easier if you just go back and read the previous post but for reasons, this was kind of supposed to be a four week trip followed by a long weekend trip to Utah a week later with a few days of work sandwiched in-between.

In the end, things didn’t quite go to plan. Circumstances changed which meant I actually ended up staying Stateside and the upshot of that was Idaho!

“Wait, Idaho was the upshot!?”

Alright, so I know that might sound strange to some of you. Who really wants to visit Idaho but it’s definitely on my mind that someday I would like to have visited all fifty states and at the time I hadn’t been to either Idaho or Utah.

We were going to Utah for a family wedding, Haleigh’s cousin (Michelle) was getting married and of course we were going to go but I found myself in a dilemma of how do I travel to Utah? In the end I decided I’d go home for a few days of work and then fly to Utah from London but I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t considered the perks of a roadtrip and the opportunity to visit a new state.

There were other things to consider too of course which is why that ultimately wasn’t the final decision I made but the allure of Idaho was calling me and I guess fate (British Airways..) determined I should stay Stateside and do a roadtrip instead.

It was a roadtrip I’d already missed out on once. Just before Covid shut the world down, myself and Haleigh had planned to go down to Salt Lake City in April 2020 and visit family – via Idaho of course. Alas, that didn’t happen and was the first casualty of the Covid travel era.

Two years on, things were starting to get back to normal and we were ready to hit the road! The plan was for us to leave Washington on Wednesday morning and get to Salt Lake City on Thursday with a night spent in Idaho.

As far as the roadtrip was concerned, there were two clear options for where to stay in Idaho: Boise or Twin Falls. We opted for the latter as it made for a better halfway point between Walla Walla and Salt Lake City and it was also a little bit cheaper to stay there than Boise.

I’ll be honest and say I didn’t really know much about Idaho. It was nice to have the opportunity to spend some time in a new state but it’s not exactly a state that tops many European’s wishlist when planning a trip to the USA. Typically Brits and Europeans are looking at other parts of North America before planning their Idaho trip!

I think my first impressions of Idaho suffered for having spent so much of this trip in Washington, Oregon and then arriving into the absurdly beautiful Utah – honestly, how is Utah a real place!?

Perhaps I’d been a little spoilt on this trip. I went back to Idaho earlier this year and whilst it still isn’t Utah-pretty, it was prettier than I’d given it credit for. Some of it is sparse and in parts of the drive there isn’t much to look at but it’s not all bad either.

My first impressions of Twin Falls were better. It’s probably as “big city” as Idaho gets but it seemed like a nice enough place to base ourselves for the night. Interestingly I discovered that one of the things Twin Falls is most famous for is being the setting of Evel Knievel’s attempt to jump the Snake River Canyon.

I thought it worth mentioning because apparently “Evil Kin-evil”, as I’d assumed the name to be, was actually a real person! I’d heard the name of course but I’d kind of always assumed it was a cleverly named cartoonish villain – like Dick Dastardly!

My limited research suggests ol’ Evel perhaps wasn’t the nicest person so I guess the evil name wasn’t entirely wasted on Mr Knievel but I was a little disappointed to discover he was nothing more than a stunt-jumper opposed to a folklore villain. Apparently he entered the ‘Guinness World Records’ for “surviving the most broken bones in a lifetime” so you might argue he wasn’t that great a stuntman either!

The canyon itself is pretty big and one of the first things you’ll see coming in to Twin Falls – I certainly wouldn’t want to jump it! We didn’t do much more than check in to our accommodation, have dinner (at another Black Bear Diner!) and hang out but Twin Falls seemed like a nice little place. We did check out the nearby Shoshone Falls on the drive home which is gorgeous – definitely worth stopping at if you find yourself in the city!

The next day it was finally onwards to Utah! Myself and Haleigh had first talked about visiting during my “big 3-0” trip in 2018 but it just felt a little too out-of-the-way for the time we had and other places we wanted to visit so we scrapped that idea. As alluded to above, we then committed to visiting in 2020 only for Covid to scupper our plans so it was third time lucky in what felt like an overdue visit of the state.

At last, I’d made it to Utah! Having family to visit is a bonus and a wedding was a particularly good reason to be visiting but I figure that Utah was a state, no matter the circumstances, I was always likely to visit someday. You hear so many good things about the State and really, I’ve only seen a fraction of it with a lot of the national parks further South, but Utah is as pretty as everyone says it is.

I was perhaps a bit harsh on Idaho further up, the drive isn’t that bad but sandwiched in-between Oregon and Utah does make a massive difference. I read a book of Bill Bryson’s earlier in the year and he talks about how lovely Idaho is after crossing the Nevada border which, having briefly stepped foot into Nevada this year, sounds much more reasonable but it’s not long after crossing into Utah that the view spectacularly improves.

As you inch closer to Salt Lake City, the view just gets better and better and better. Salt Lake City is surrounded by 360 degree mountain views – it doesn’t matter which way you look, you will see mountains. It’s an absurdly beautiful city.

The thing that struck me most about Salt Lake City was how American it felt. Strip away the mountainous views and there’s no mistake that you’re in an American city.

It had everything that you’d expect of the USA – the big highways and cars and highway advertisements everywhere. The fast food-chains and drive-thru-everything’s, the massive malls and all of this in Austria or Switzerland-like surroundings. I don’t know why but I just found it really endearing, there was an inexplicable charm about Salt Lake City, I was smitten.

We didn’t even really do anything of note in Salt Lake City. We were only in town for a few days which was primarily for a wedding and the free time we did have was largely spent with family. There was no legitimate reason for me to hold Salt Lake City in such esteem or have such a fondness for it but I did. Maybe I got carried away with how pretty it is but it felt like a special city and one that more people should be visiting.

We happened to go back to Salt Lake City earlier this year and got a chance to actually spend some proper time there and explore a bit further and I felt a little vindicated. It’s a wonderful city!

I’ve been fortunate to have visited a few of the big cities in the US and I think Salt Lake City is up there with the best of them. When travelling I often find myself asking “could I live here?” and Salt Lake City is one of those places that I don’t think would take much persuasion – and believe me, there’ve been plenty of attempts at that!

Anyway, back to this particular trip. We got ourselves settled in to our AirBnB and then all we really did on Thursday and Friday was visit family. With the exception of the happy couple, Michelle and David, I hadn’t actually spent much time with the Utah side of the family. I’d only properly met most of them at the start of the month in the run up to our own wedding so it was nice to have more time together.

and just like that, it was time for another wedding!

I first met Michelle and David way back in February 2020 when they’d made the trip up to Washington for a few days and along with Haleigh the four of us had a little Valentine’s double date. We walked away from that evening thinking “we should go to Utah for spring break..”

That didn’t happen of course, Covid scuppered our plans but I think it’s testament to the impression both of them make. I adore them both and as soon as there was wedding talk there was no doubt I’d be in attendance (assuming that I was invited!).

I won’t go in to all of the ins and outs of the day but it was exciting to be here to see the two of them get married. We got ourselves ready in the morning and then headed on over to the venue to help with any last minute preparations so we arrived earlier than most guests.

Interestingly the venue itself was a clay shooting venue so it was quite weird to arrive to the sound of people shooting. The venue was reserved for the wedding obviously so they weren’t there much longer after we’d arrived but it was still an odd experience for someone such as myself, not entirely used to the gun-crazy culture of America.

Shooting facility aside, it was a lovely venue. The ceremony itself would take place outdoors and it was a beautiful day – again surrounded by mountain views because Salt Lake City, you know? Did I mention the city has mountains everywhere you look? I feel like I should have mentioned that.

With everything set up, we were ready to go. It was time to watch two of the loveliest people get married. I know it’s cliche and whatever, you always read or hear memorials of how wonderful a person was after their death and maybe it’s in bad taste to talk ill of the dead but just once I’d love to read the death of somebody reported with quotes of them “being an asshole”

“Dexter? Look, I loved my brother but he was partial to a bit of murder now and then – he only murdered people that deserved it though!”

As ever I’m getting side-tracked but cliche or not, these truly are just a joy to be around and it was evident throughout the day just how much love they have for eachother.

I’m a sucker for a wedding so it’s needless to say that this was another lovely day. The ceremony was beautiful and I definitely teared up a little during the vows and speeches. The venue was stunning, there’s just something special about an outdoor wedding and the mountain views help of course! The bride and groom both looked great and it was such an honour to be there to celebrate with them both. If it wasn’t obvious, I adore them both and it was great to see them so happy on their day.

Sadly, things eventually have to come to an end. We waved off the happy couple at the end of the night and promised to make future plans with our “April anniversary buddies”. It was the perfect way to round off April.

On Sunday (1st May) we made the long drive back to Washington – all in one day. We did stop off in Twin Falls again for lunch and as I hinted at above, took a little detour via Shoshone Falls which made the day a little more interesting than a full day on the road.

Soon enough we were back in Washington and this time it would genuinely be the final week in Washington. More on that next time!

Stay tuned!

Jason

P.S – if you’ve missed any other posts in this series you can catch up below!
A wedding in Washington: an introduction!
A wedding in Washington: week one!
A wedding in Washington: wedding time!
A wedding in Washington: the honeymoon!
A wedding in Washington: the final week!

A wedding in Washington: the final week!

Hello dear readers! We’re cracking on with another post in the wedding series!

In all honesty this’ll be a pretty boring post as far as the series is concerned but nevertheless, it’s an important part of the story as my time in Washington was theoretically coming to an end.

Before I crack on I’m going to give you a quick reminder on all of the logistics for this trip. I did talk about it in the first post of the series but that was a while ago so let me rejog your memories.

I think any couple getting married have much to think about before a wedding but an international wedding added some further things to think about and in terms of trip lengthy I ideally wanted four weeks in the USA – which my employers were perfectly happy to approve given the circumstances.

I figured having two weeks before the wedding and two weeks after the wedding was a good balance and allowed time for things to potentially go wrong before the wedding (me and my family all had our flights cancelled!) whilst also allowing a bit of time after the wedding to enjoy the first days of married life!

It was a perfect plan but a small spanner in the works was Haleigh’s cousin, Michelle, was getting married in Utah at the end of the month – three weeks after our own wedding.

I wouldn’t have missed their wedding for the world. They’re the cutest couple and I adore them both but it did pose some questions about what I now do about my own trip. Do I push for five weeks off work? Do I want to take five weeks off work for one trip? Do I leave myself less time before the wedding and more time after the wedding to go down to Utah? What do I do?

I’m very mindful of my annual leave each year. Our company offer a scheme that allows you to buy an extra week and with the wedding in mind I took full advantage of this to bump my leave off up to six weeks but for an entire year that is still not enough – give me 26 weeks, please!

I think this influenced my decision making a little so I stuck with the original plan. I was going to Washington for four weeks, flying home for a few days of work and then I’d fly back to Utah for a long weekend to catch the second wedding. It wasn’t ideal but any days annual leave spared this year was a blessing!

Anyway, with all that in mind, this was my final week in Washington. I’d already had three weeks on the West coast by this point so the final week was just about making the best of the time I had left in Washington before we’d separate again. Admittedly I’d be seeing Haleigh and some of the family down in Utah in a couple of weeks but there’d be other family I now probably wouldn’t see until Thanksgiving maybe.

We spent the first half of the week doing the boring post-wedding stuff. The marriage licence, name changes for Haleigh, you get the gist..

The second half of the week was spent enjoying Walla Walla, visiting a few favourite hangout spots and bidding farewell to family I wasn’t going to see any time soon. On Thursday evening myself and Haleigh had ourselves a final date night as I’d be leaving on Saturday and the Friday happened to be Haleigh’s brother’s birthday so we had a meal out planned with a number of people.

It was bittersweet to think that two weeks after getting married it was back to the long distance stuff.

‘Til bureaucracy, immigration laws and visa restrictions do us part” as the famous vows go.

On the Friday I was trying not to think about that and looking forward. Yes, I was leaving tomorrow but when would I be back? What time were my flights to Denver the following Thursday? What time were my onward flights to Salt Lake City? I did the logical thing and had a look!

Now, anyone familiar with the British Airways app will know the first thing it shows you when you open the app are the details of your next flight. I was specifically looking for my London to Denver flight information but up popped my next flight.

“Seattle to London – delayed!”

Wait, what? It’s Friday morning, my flight isn’t until Saturday evening. I can’t even check in yet, how can my flight possibly already be delayed!? I thought it was weird but okay, whatever. Tell me more, how long is the delay – *click*

I was facing a 20 hour delay! Twenty! What the fuck?

Seriously, let’s revisit the plan because what the hell do I do from here? I was flying in to Seattle on Saturday morning and now leaving some time on Sunday afternoon with no accommodation inbetween. I was supposed to be back at work on Monday but wouldn’t be landing in England until Monday lunchtime and for what, a three day turnaround? I’d be back Stateside in just a few days which was arguably illogical to begin with but a huge delay was a real spanner in the works.

Now what do I do? I had six upcoming flights to think about over the next week and a half, I had three days of work to consider and every solution was a form of unnecessary hassle. It’s worth reiterating at this point that BA had cancelled my flight coming here too so they’d inconvenienced me on both ends of the trip.

Of course this nonsense doesn’t happen when it’s one solitary flight does it? Here were my issues:

1) The flight times are what they are. With no changes, I was stranded in Seattle without accommodation for a night. Do I book accommodation in Seattle for a night?
2) If I don’t book accommodation, can I possibly move my domestic flight from Walla Walla to a day later?
3) Either option, means I leave a day late. I miss work on Monday? Is there really any point in going home for just two days of work?
4) Let’s say I don’t go home, how does that affect work? How does that affect the Utah trip?
5) Let’s say I don’t go home, I sort out work, I drive down to Utah with Haleigh and the family. How do I then get home? Do I drive back to Washington with them? Do I try and fly home from Utah?
6) Let’s say I drive down and fly home from Utah? Can I actually fly home from Utah? How do return flights work if you miss the first leg of the journey? I was flying with BA from London to Denver and then with Frontier from Denver to Salt Lake City. It only takes one of those airlines to see I haven’t traveled and not save me a seat for the return flight. That’s conversations with two airlines to make sure I’m not stranded somewhere.
7) Let’s say I drive down to Utah, drive back to Washington after the wedding, when can I actually get home? The wedding was Saturday and my flight home had been Sunday which worked fine with Monday being a public holiday in England. There was no way I could fly home from Washington in the same timeline if I stayed.

The knock-on effect of one flight delay was ridiculous. Also, 20 hours!? Come on!

After much deliberation I settled on a plan. Scrap flying home, I’m staying. I’m not leaving on April 23rd (now 24th), I’m leaving on Saturday the 7th of May. We’ll drive down for the wedding, we’ll come back, we’ll apologetically work remotely and we’ll make it work. Two more weeks in the USA – perfect!

“Computer says no.”

Alaska Airlines couldn’t have made things easier for me. My Walla Walla flight was amendable at no extra cost, infact I actually got a voucher for the difference in flight costs as I guess the flight I changed to was cheaper, and this was all doable online. Bish, bash, bosh!

British Airways? Ugh, horrendous! I could change my flight but only for a fee. Hardly my fault that this situation was not of my own making but great, I’m going to have to talk to an actual person.

“Phone says no.” – call back another time, thank you!

I’ll admit, patience was still with me at this point so I waited and called back a little later. I reached the point of being placed on hold at least and persisted with it before eventually getting through to a person.

“BA says no.”

This is a good time to add that this shit-show was discovered entirely out of good fortune. It’s only because I was investigating my next batch of flights that I even spotted this delay. There was no phonecall, no text, no email, no notification of any kind to make me aware that the schedule had suddenly changed so it’s here where things start going sour.

In fairness the phonecall started positively with a “let’s get you home” kind of attitude you want from a customer representative but it was shortlived. I laid out my demands if you will – “my flight has been delayed, can you move it to this date..” and after a first failed attempt, BA were suddenly backtracking.

“Impossible to change the status..”, “you’ll need to speak to Seatac Airport..” and “you should have contacted us sooner..” among a selection of favourite catchphrases. How I was supposed to achieve the latter is still a mystery to me given I hadn’t been informed of the delay to begin with.

I went round and round in circles with the BA rep, insistent that there was nothing she could do beyond cancel my flight with a flight voucher unlikely to cover the cost of booking a new one-way flight.

Now I’m a pretty agreeable person. It’s arguably one of my best and worst traits. I’m a people-pleaser, easy-going. Don’t make too much fuss, you know? So I’ll give myself some credit here for my persistence. This phonecall was not ending without a solution that didn’t leave me out-of-pocket. I was getting increasingly irritated at an attempt to just fob me off but when it comes to travel, I know my rights.

Many “I’ll put you on hold” instances later and my BA rep achieved what had reportedly been impossible an hour earlier. “We can’t change your flight when it’s in this status” seemingly didn’t ring true. They did change my flight, they did so at no extra cost and I got exactly what I’d asked for an hour earlier.

It was honestly infuriating. I’m such an easy-going person but I was so wound up by the end of the phonecall. I’d never want to be the person to take that out on the customer service rep but it’s not easy when you’re being told something can’t be done which seemingly can be done with enough pushback. It shouldn’t take that much pushback and it still leaves a bit of a sour taste.

After an ~~lifetime~~ hour on the phone, it was time to go out and celebrate with the birthday boy. We returned to a Walla Walla favourite, Clarette’s, and had a good time with the family. The next few days were pretty chilled. I had to work remotely for the first few days of the week of course and on UK times but it wasn’t too bad.

Soon enough the out-of-office was back on and we were heading down to Utah! More on that next time!

Stay tuned!

Jason

P.S – if you’ve missed any of the previous posts in the series, you can catch up below!
A wedding in Washington: an introduction!
A wedding in Washington: week one!
A wedding in Washington: wedding time!
A wedding in Washington: the honeymoon!

A wedding in Washington: wedding time!

Hello dear readers! Well, well well, this is the post you’ve been waiting for isn’t it? After teasing you with a few posts building up to the big day, this was finally it! Almost.

Ha! I’ve still got to build you up to it a little bit right? For those of you that haven’t been following this series of posts, go back and read the earlier posts first (linked at the bottom) and then you’ll be all caught up!

Anyway, I’d been in Washington for a week by this point and all that was left were the final bits and pieces before the big day. One such errand to run was paying for the wedding itself.

Ooof, that was not a fun bill to settle!

This was partially in thanks to Covid stopping me doing anything fun (travel, football, events..) but saving for a wedding left my bank looking the healthiest it had looked in a long time. Our wedding wasn’t extortionate, it was reasonable but nonetheless my bank balance looked prettier than it had in quite some time and then suddenly *poof* – all gone!

“That’ll be $$$’s please!”

There was me hoping that there wouldn’t be any problems with the payment going through. You kind of wonder when paying a large transaction such as a wedding bill if those monitoring your account are going to flag it up as suspicious, particularly when it’s a transaction in another country.

Of course, there was absolutely no scrutiny on the transaction on this occasion. My bank make sure to ask me to authorise my £9 taxi booking in Peterborough every fucking time I book a taxi but a massive wedding in another country – “No authorisation needed mate. We trust you!”

So for any fraudsters reading, it’s the big ticket items you want to go and splash my cash on. Go buy yourself a car or a house instead because they’ll probably decline that batch of eggs you want from Walmart (although I appreciate those might be pricey these days too!).

Feeling much poorer, we went and met up with our DJ, David, for a quick drink. It was a chance for us to properly meet in person and also for him to get a better idea of what we expected on the day in terms of music, speeches and so on.

Although I think both of our music tastes are quite varied so we were equally happy to allow requests and were mostly hopeful that people would enjoy themselves. David was free to make his own judgment as to what songs were / weren’t working on the day, with perhaps one exception I’ll expand on later!

The rest of the week was mostly about relaxing and waiting. The biggest drama leading up to the wedding was the bridesmaid dress fiasco. Admittedly had Haleigh not had a hundred odd bridesmaids (“it was nine Jason, 9!”) it might not have been such a dilemma but there were still a few bridesmaids yet to receive their dress which caused a bit of stress. In the end Jenny’s didn’t turn up at all, nor could we find an adequate replacement at the last minute so she unfortunately stepped down – although was still a bridesmaid in spirit!

The waiting was the worst part of the week. Waiting for the big day to arrive, waiting for friends and family to arrive in to town. Haleigh had family and friends dotted all over the Pacific Northwest and Utah, plus a handful of people coming from elsewhere.

Likewise I had a few American friends that were making their way over from the East coast, plus my family coming from England too of course. We’d had some Covid scares and flight cancellations with the family but they were finally on their way and landed in Seattle on the Thursday before the wedding!

The family hadn’t really seen much of the USA. Mum, dad and Natasha (my sister) had only previously been to Florida. Pete (my brother-in-law) had seen a fraction more of the country but only on the East coast so I was excited for them to see and explore the West coast for the first time!

Those of you familiar with Washington will know that it’s stunning! I insisted that the family had to drive at least one way between Seattle and Walla Walla (Haleigh’s hometown) because the views are gorgeous – as it was they decided to drive both ways.

They landed in Seattle on the Thursday afternoon before driving over to Walla Walla on Friday morning. The excitement was building. I don’t know if that was even necessarily about the wedding. The family seemed equally enthusiastic about encountering tumbleweed for the first time and talking pedestrian crossings (“wait..”) as much as anything else!

Anyway.. everyone was keen to meet up before the wedding as neither family had met prior to the trip so after briefly getting themselves settled into their AirBnB for the next few nights, the fun could begin!

First up was the wedding rehearsal! The rehearsal was at the same venue as the wedding itself, Walla Walla’s landmark hotel – the Marcus Whitman. It’s the tallest building in Walla Walla and a quick Google search defines it as a “historic” hotel and apparently it has been listed on America’s “National register of historic places” which makes me chuckle a little because it was “only” built in 1928. Obviously the USA as we know it now is a much younger country but nobody would bat an eyelid at a 100 year old building here in Europe.

Anyway, the rehearsal was fairly casual. Our wedding co-ordinator was great and gave us the run down of how things would go, although I seemingly should have paid more attention as I definitely had a little “whoopsie” moment on the day itself.

After the rehearsal we popped over to a nearby Mexican restaurant which was the first opportunity for the immediate family to mingle and spend some time together. The food was good, the company better and we all had a lovely time before heading our separate ways – with leftovers in hand in the case of my family who were a bit unprepared for the portion sizes for meals even as simple as a salad.

“Welcome to America!”

Mine and Haleigh’s final night as an unmarried couple saw us go our separate ways after dinner. Haleigh was staying in a nearby hotel with a number of the girls so they all had their girly get-together and it was always on my mind to do a thing of my own on the Friday too – particularly as Covid had made it difficult to plan any proper stag do. With so many ever-changing restrictions there was never a good time for such an occasion so in the end I kind of decided to forego having one.

This wasn’t a stag really, more a casual get-together with a few of the wedding guests and a chance for my family to meet a few more faces. My mum and Natasha had joined Haleigh, whilst Dad and Pete had joined myself for an evening at a local favourite – the Red Monkey!

I think around 12 of us got together in the end for an evening spent enjoying a few drinks and good company too. We were the last to leave the Red Monkey staying until closing, if not slightly beyond that. Although it closed around 11pm so not as late as you might expect on a Friday night.

Some of us may have been tempted to head onwards but Walla Walla seemingly isn’t the place for a late night on the town. My brother in law optimistically asked “where are we going?” and I misconstrued that as needing directions back to their AirBnB because the reality was that there was nowhere else to go but home!

It was probably for the best anyway. I certainly didn’t want to wake up feeling rough the next morning and perhaps it was better the evening ended on a high for everyone. It had been a fun evening and a good chance for everyone to get to know eachother a little better.

Everyone dispersed in their own directions whilst I headed back to my own hotel for the night, waking up hangover free the next morning and ready to get married!

The next morning I checked out and popped over to the family’s AirBnB so we could all go and grab a wedding-day breakfast together. This being their first morning in Walla Walla I had a couple of ideas on where to take them and show them a little of downtown too.

We headed to Maple Counter Cafe – an optimistic choice for breakfast on a Saturday morning but it’s one of the best breakfast spots in the city. Unsurprisingly they were busy and the wait was longer than we’d have liked. Unfortunately you can’t book in advance either or I’d have made sure to do that.

They do have a kind of buzzer service when you arrive, where they’ll text you when your table is ready but I don’t know how well that works when you don’t have an American phone number. Rather than confuse them with our strange international phone numbers, we decided to try our luck elsewhere.

The next best option was ‘Bacon & Eggs’ which was another block over and fortunately they were able to get a table for us quite quickly. They’re another good option in Walla Walla and are actually currently in the process of moving in to a bigger building which is exciting!

It was a good choice and whilst the family went for more traditional breakfast options, I did let them try some of my ‘biscuits and gravy’ that I’d personally gone for. Always a good choice!

After breakfast we had a brief wander through the downtown area of Walla Walla. It was a chance for the family to get a small glimpse before we headed back to their AirBnB for a relatively relaxed morning. Naturally we found time to watch the football back home. An Arsenal defeat followed by a Tottenham win – what more could you ask for on such a big day?

Spurs have spoiled many a weekend throughout my life but even Tottenham had got the memo for once – perfect!

After the football we started getting ourselves ready which really didn’t take long, had some “getting ready” photos taken and then there was just tons of time to kill so myself, dad and Pete went back to the Red Monkey for a pre-wedding pint.

We extended the invitation to a couple of Haleigh’s family but perhaps it says it all about English drink culture that they politely declined in search of lunch instead. I guess it’ll just be the three Brits off to the pub then!

There aren’t too many differences between an English wedding and an American wedding, I think for the most part the events of the day are similar but there are maybe some minor differences. Even then, some of these are perhaps just couple specific rather than being about the culture.

We had a bit of a later ceremony which meant we did some of the other things a bit earlier in the day. After a quick pint I popped back to the hotel for the “first look” and some more official wedding photos. This was kind of in contrast to any other wedding I’d been to, where you first see the bride in her dress as she walks down the aisle, but it was really nice and you still have that special first moment – although I’d almost inadvertently walked in to one of the areas of the hotel where Haleigh was having some photos before we were supposed to meet! That was an awkward and immediate 180 to scarper elsewhere!

Personally I think it worked better having done some of these things earlier in the day. It meant later in the day, after the ceremony, we could just enjoy the rest of the wedding celebrations without further interruptions.

I think it’s probably credit to our wedding co-ordinator but despite getting family photos and things, we were still ahead of schedule in our timings so we had time to mingle with guests as they were arriving which was also really nice.

Eventually it was time for the ceremony – the important part I suppose!

I was asked a number of times in the period up to the wedding if I was getting nervous and there’d never been a point I’d felt any nerves. Neither on the day or the weeks / months prior, in my head there was nothing to be nervous about. I was getting married because I wanted to, you know?

However if there was ever a time that the nerves were going to hit it was going to be now, the ceremony and all eyes on the couple. I think I must have just blanked out the room walking in, I don’t remember seeing where anyone was sat when walking down the aisle.

One of the reasons you do a wedding rehearsal is to make sure all of these things run smoothly. One of the fun things about an American wedding is that you can have someone of your choosing marry you – think Joey in Friends!

You still have to go through the process of getting ordained of course but we asked Haleigh’s uncle, Rob, to marry us which he was really honoured to do but that rehearsal theoretically helps alleviate any nerves and makes sure everyone knows what they’re doing! Except the groom..

Alright, so the fault of this is nobody’s but my own. I said earlier in the post that I’d had my “whoopsie” moment and I guess I jumped the gun a little bit. People came in one by one, stood where they were supposed to and then the beautiful bride arrives and as she reaches the end of the aisle I play my part in throwing everything out of sync!

There’s a whole process, a ceremony you might even call it! Part of that ceremony is that the bride is “given away” but I’d seemingly skipped ahead and collected “my” bride too soon. Immediate confusion ensued – “too eager son, what are you doing!?”

I said previously that a lot of the burden of wedding planning had fallen on Haleigh’s shoulders because she was the one in Washington. Really I had one job – turn up and get married and I hadn’t even nailed that part!

In my defence though, this was my first wedding! Maybe when you’re several weddings in you know the process like the back of your hand but I was only planning on doing this once!

If there had been any nerves in the room, I’d instantaneously alleviated them. It was a hilarious moment, even if people were only laughing at me rather than with me, but it made for some great photos on the day! If you want candid photos of guests in hysterics, get the groom to cock up!

The rest of the ceremony went off without a hitch, except the part where we got hitched obviously. We were finally married! The only thing left to do was sign the paperwork with the confusing American dates and make it all official!

Let’s invalidate this wedding immediately by accidentally signing it the 4th of September instead of the ninth of April! Luckily neither myself, or my dad, messed things up!

The rest of the day was lovely. Food, fun and games. It was wonderful having so many come together to celebrate with us and seemingly enjoy themselves. We’d had some guests come a long way and it meant a lot to us. I mostly kept it together in my own speech but there were certainly happy tears throughout the day. Weddings are such happy occasions that I often find myself tearing up during them and my own was unsurprisingly no exception.

There were several highlights for me but one definitely worthy of a mention as a fun anecdote for the blog goes back to the DJ. As I’d said, I think our music taste is pretty varied and I didn’t really have any real preference as to what songs were played. Haleigh had put together a playlist but I think there were lots of things that didn’t end up being played in exchange for other songs people had requested, were seemingly enjoying and getting up to dance to. You know, the typical wedding-friendly songs and anthems. I didn’t care too much as I knew I’d dance to whatever. I only had one specific request: Madness!

I don’t know if this is an English thing in general or more exclusive to our own family weddings but I live by the mantra that “it’s not a wedding without a bit of Madness” – I feel like they’ve been played at every wedding I’ve been to and they’re one of those bands you make sure you’re on the dance-floor for!

You HAVE to have Madness played at the wedding! Right, right?
No? Well, you’re wrong!

It was a small request and I was sat with a couple of friends who’d come all the way from Maryland and BAM! – “Sorry, I’ve got to go..”

In America however, this seemingly has the reverse effect.
BAM – “what the hell is this!?”

Myself, Haleigh (who has been to two English weddings and is properly educated at this point), mum, Natasha and Pete made our way to the dance-floor but it otherwise empties! The only exception was little ol’ Mason attending his first ever wedding, dancing to anything and having the time of his life!

Imagine the DJ’s pain!
“There’s lots of people dancing, I guess I’m doing a good job! Wait, where are you all going!?

Now, Wikipedia suggests that Madness went on their first US tour in TWELVE years in 2024 so you might say that the revival started here and they’re now loved by Americans but that certainly wasn’t reflected in this moment. We’d murdered the dance-floor with our strange, strange English music!

It was hilarious to me. We had a room full of confused Americans looking on at a group of Brits that had seemingly lost their mind – “what has Haleigh married in to!?”

Sadly all good things come to an end and as the time passed, things started to unwind – not because of Madness I’ll add! The dancefloor did recover from that debacle and I think people had had a good time but people slowly started saying their goodbyes and heading home. We ended the night with the infamous “We Are Family” as both familes came together on the dancefloor which seemed a fitting song to end the night on.

We’d both had a lovely day and I think we’d have been perfectly happy calling it a night and retreating to our hotel but my family were heading back in to town for another drink, alongside a friend of mine (Alison) from the East coast. Haleigh was keen to join them so suited and booted we walked back over to the Red Monkey – a third visit in the last 24 hours for myself, Dad and Pete!

It’s notable to say at this point that Haleigh isn’t really much of a drinker. She’ll have the occasional drink but it’s not something she particularly enjoys and certainly not on the same scale as us Brits are used to on the pissed up island we call home. Nevertheless Haleigh thought it’d be a really good idea to have a shot with her new Mother-in-Law and on the recommendation of the waitress they both took a “Fireball” shot (I think).

We only had the one drink I think and just enjoyed eachother’s company more than anything but the fireball was not a good choice! It didn’t go down well!

Sadly it was a short and sweet trip for the family. One of the reasons we were keen to join them was because this was one of their few nights in Walla Walla. They obviously weren’t going to miss the wedding but the original September 2021 date had been better around their work commitments, moving to April meant they couldn’t visit Washington for as long as they’d liked so they’d soon be heading back to Seattle to spend a few days there.

We were meeting up for breakfast but said our goodbyes and made our way back to our fancy wedding hotel – the luxurious hotel in the heart of Walla Walla. We’d spent no more than a minute in the room at this point and arrived to find a generous collection of cards and gifts awaiting us in our room.

Unfortunately it was soon after that that the regret had hit Haleigh.
“What have I done!?”
“I’ve made a mistake..”
“I don’t feel good..”

Fear not! The marriage hadn’t crashed and burned this early! Marrying me was the single greatest decision Haleigh has ever made, obviously, but the fireball had sadly started to have its effect!

What can I say? Here we were, in our nice fancy hotel, and Haleigh wanted to be anywhere but. She felt rough. She showered hoping that might help and then we tried to sleep but with no success (ha, let’s be honest. I was probably snoring!). Haleigh just couldn’t get comfortable and wanted to go home and curl up in her own bed.

The vows of “in sickness and in health” were put to the test early on in our marriage! Admittedly, I don’t think it likely that those vows refer to self-inflicted fireball sickness but at silly-o-clock in the morning we were checking out.

“Did you enjoy your stay..?”

We made it back to the house and Haleigh rested up for a few hours before breakfast. By this point I was fairly awake already so as the good husband that I am, I let Haleigh have the bed to herself to rest up and I took the early start as an opportunity to watch some English football back at the house – I guess we all have our sicknesses, don’t we? This was mine!

Fortunately a few hours later, Haleigh was feeling much better. We freshened up and made our way to Clarette’s for breakfast with the family. Clarette’s is a staple of Walla Walla – they’re a diner that have been serving locals for more than 60 years and are an all-day favourite but we wanted to bring my family here on their first visit to Walla Walla.

Fortunately this is one of the restaurants you can make a restaurant because this is a popular breakfast spot at the weekend! We’d booked ahead and were soon enjoying a hearty breakfast, plentiful of tea (probably more than Clarette’s are used to serving!) and good company.

It was then time to say goodbye. Myself and Haleigh were heading out of town later today (more on that in the next post!) and the rest of the family would be heading up to Seattle tomorrow. They had one final day to enjoy in Walla Walla and Haleigh’s brother, Ben, kindly played tour guide and showed them the best of the “sights” of Walla Walla.

It had been a lovely few days and particularly lovely to have had the families come together to celebrate with us. I’d met much of Haleigh’s family prior to this trip and Haleigh had met some of mine but they’d yet to meet eachother so it was nice to see everyone get along. More of Haleigh’s family has since visited England and I’m sure it won’t be too far in the future before mine return to the West coast to explore more than they saw in their limited time on this trip.

Sadly, that was that for the wedding fun. Before the day was over, myself and Haleigh would be heading onwards to Oregon! More on that next time!

Stay tuned!

Jason

P.S – I’m going to include all posts from this series at the bottom of each post so you can go back and read any posts that you’ve missed.

P.P.S – enjoy some more wedding photos too!

Catch up on earlier posts in the series:
Introduction post
Week one post

A wedding in Washington: week one!

Hello dear readers! I thought I’d quickly throw another post at you because the last one was just a bit of a short introduction so it felt only right to treat you with a proper post and begin the actual story!

For those of you who missed that introduction, you can catch up here but essentially this was the beginning of the unforgettable trip that would theoretically result in my marriage!

I say theoretically because as is the case with any international wedding, the first problem is getting there! I think there’d be a bit of anxiety about an international wedding at the best of times but in early 2022 we weren’t in the best of times. Travel was undoubtedly better off than in 2020 and 2021, and I maintain that 2021 was worse than 2020, but we still had some way to go and hoops to jump through in 2022.

We’d already postponed the wedding once. Our plans to get married in Washington in September 2021 were scuppered by the reality that the US border remained closed to outsiders. Those pesky illegal aliens!

People say the wedding is all about the bride so I suppose Haleigh didn’t have to postpone. She could have had a big party in Washington with her family and friends but I dare say that the groom is actually partially fundamental to the occasion so we rescheduled for April 2022 instead.

I’d rather reluctantly booked my flight to Seattle for the Sunday (27th March). I wanted to be in Washington two weeks before our wedding on April 9th but a Saturday flight was £250 more than the Sunday and I just couldn’t justify such a difference for the sake of a day – particularly when any pennies saved were pennies towards the wedding.

Guess what happened?

British Airways cancelled thousands of flights. Naturally mine was affected, along with my parents, sister and brother-in-law who were flying out to Seattle in April. Of course it would happen on this trip wouldn’t it? That little bit of extra unnecessary faff!

The upshot? BA allowed me to move my flight to Saturday 26th at no extra cost. What a stupidly positive resolution. This was the day I’d wanted to fly to Seattle originally but because of the silly fare I wasn’t and now I could just move my flight like that? Make it make sense!

Nevertheless I was pleased. One extra day in Washington, assuming I got there. The other concern at the time was Covid of course. Several weeks before they were due to travel, my sister and brother-in-law caught Covid for the first time. They’d recovered by the time they were due to travel but come on, let’s not do this now!

I’d avoided it myself for over two years and there was that little niggle that I was going to catch it at the worst possible time and not make it to my own wedding for a second time! Any other trip I’d have sucked it up and suffered the consequences of a cancelled trip but I was desperately hoping it wouldn’t happen now.

One of the daftest things I found in this era of travel was that the only concern was with meeting the criteria at a specific moment in time. I was due to fly on Saturday so went and did a Covid test on Friday morning to satisfy the US restrictions at the time but there’s zero concern for what you do after that test.

Our office cancelled our work Christmas party in December and just so happened to have rescheduled for the Friday afternoon before I was travelling. I had to test myself on Friday morning and then I was free to do whatever I pleased for the next 24 hours.

Do I go to the office party? Don’t I? Does it matter? I was just as likely to pick it up in an airport or on the plane or in America. It seemed such a daft flaw in the system.

I’d paid for the express same-day service which fortunately confirmed I didn’t have Covid at that specific time but still, who would really know if I had Covid by the time I landed Stateside?

Anyway with a negative test, I was on my way to Heathrow! Heathrow was a bit chaotic but I made my way through security and could finally look forward to the trip. I made my way towards my gate, scanned my boarding pass and the machine immediately said “nope”. I tried again and had the same pushback – “please speak to an actual human!”

Be it a random security check or whatever, BA verified everything they had to and then printed me a new boarding pass with words to the effect of “enjoy your upgrade”.

New boarding pass in hand, I distanced myself from the peasants at the back of the plane and made way to.. well, premium economy but still – a little extra legroom felt like a win!

There were no other notable perks but it was a nice way to kick off this trip. Perhaps BA knew? It’s the first time I’ve ever received a flight upgrade and it made up for some of the other cockups on this trip!

Anyway, soon enough myself and Haleigh had been reunited in Washington – two weeks before the wedding!

We had a few pre-wedding errands to run before the big day. One of which was buying wedding rings which you should probably do earlier than we did but I think the intention was we’d buy them together in person!

Important to mention because Haleigh came and met me in Seattle. Normally I’d just fly directly in to Walla Walla but on this trip that didn’t happen. We had a late night shopping outing at a nearby mall, failing to buy any rings, but the upshot to staying in Seattle on that first night was a trip to the Cheesecake Factory.

I gave brief mention to the Cheesecake Factory on a previous San Francisco blog-post but thought it worth giving a mention here too because I don’t think my English or other international readers will quite appreciate its popularity.

You see it mentioned in pop culture, The Big Bang Theory for instance, and it’s one of those names that I’d always been familiar with but visiting it is an experience in itself. I think I appreciated that even more here.

Honestly I’m trying to think of an English or British equivalent and I don’t know that there is such a place.

We visited the Cheesecake Factory in San Francisco a few years earlier and had to wait a while and I was like “well it’s summer and we’re in the heart of the city, it’s dinner time. Of course it’s busy” but no, this wasn’t a San Francisco thing. This is a Cheesecake Factory thing.

America is crazy for the place. It’s worth saying here that they don’t just sell cheesecake, America isn’t that crazy. Their menu is pretty extensive and that’s undoubtedly the cause of its popularity because they have just about everything you can think of on the menu.

We were right out by the airport, not even in downtown Seattle, but it was stupidly busy here too. We had to wait a while for a table with people constantly streaming in and out, it’s predominantly a restaurant but the number of people coming in purely for takeout cheesecake was a bit mind-blowing.

Eventually we were seated and it was good. It usually is, I like the Cheesecake Factory but I think good is sufficient enough praise for what it is. It isn’t Michelin Star fine dining but it’s still equally popular Stateside – if you do visit, expect a wait!

Anyway, it was a nice way to start the trip. The next morning we drove through the beautiful mountains and made our way to lovely Walla Walla. Truthfully it was a pretty relaxing first week. There were a couple of things to take care of, last minute bits and pieces but the majority of stuff had already been dealt with.

We did go and find rings eventually. Honestly, I’ve never been one for wearing jewellery.

Also sidenote but curse the Americanised spellcheck because it really threw me that WordPress thinks that I’ve spelt jewellery incorrectly. I had to double check only to discover its another Americanism or probably Americanizm with your silly Z’s, right?

Anyway as I was saying, I’ve never been one for wearing jewellery so ring-shopping was an interesting experience. I think the idea of it and symbolism behind it incase of a marriage is nice so I was always going to buy one but I don’t think I ever believed I’d wear it beyond the wedding day.

With that in mind I didn’t give a huge amount of consideration to all the different options. Maybe if I’d known how much wear it’d get I’d have gone for something more eye-catching and glamorous but I kept it simplistic – a simple gold band – “that’ll do!”

To emphasise the point, they asked if I knew my ring size (psh, no) and then if I wanted it resized. Haleigh went down that route but I didn’t bother. It’s not a perfect fit but I figured it’ll stay on my hand for the probable one day of my life that I wear it.

It’s funny how quickly you become accustomed to wearing it. I can’t imagine not wearing it now, on the occasions it isn’t on my hand it feels strange and it’s immediately noticeable. So if you see an oversized ring sitting on my finger anytime, that’s the story behind why!

We had a few other minor errands to run, such as arranging to get our marriage licence but really it was a mostly stress-free run up to the wedding. We did our best to relax, enjoy our time together and also enjoy the time in Washington.

That’s worth remembering. This was a wedding trip for me, of course it was the fundamental reason that I was here but it was also a bit of a break. Four weeks without work. Four weeks to just enjoy that sense of being free.

I can’t recall where Haleigh had disappeared to, I think she might have met a friend for coffee, but I found myself with a morning to myself and I vividly remember sitting downtown thinking “I could live here..”.

That was never the plan. The plan was that we’d get married and Haleigh would move over to England but not for the first time, I was reminded that Washington really has become a second home for me. I could see myself living in Walla Walla, I could see myself living in Washington, I could see myself living in the USA.

I understand why people are concerned by some of the things that happen in America and some of their policies, I share many of those concerns. I’m not suggesting it’s perfect by any means but I think it sometimes gets lost in the politics that it is still a phenomenal country.

I’m luckier than most. I’ve visited 15 states which is probably more than most Americans and the more I see of the country, the more I appreciate how diverse it is. It has so much to offer and Washington epitomises that aswell as anywhere else in the states.

So I was happy to be here. Not having to worry about work helped of course but Spring was springing (that’s totally a phrase, right?) and Walla Walla was a lovely place to be in the time up to the wedding.

We didn’t do anything overly exciting with our free-time, we frequented a few favourites around the area such as “The Tux” in nearby Prescott and had a couple of jaunts over to the Tri Cities for various reasons aswell as enjoying our time in Walla Walla.

Soon enough we were going in to another week and family and friends were beginning to arrive in to town for the big day. More on that next time!

Stay tuned!

Jason

A wedding in Washington: an introduction!

Hello dear readers! How are things!? I recently rounded off my 2021 travels with a blog post all about my annual Thanksgiving visit to Washington and so onwards to 2022 we go!

Isn’t it great following such an up-to-date blogger? As our third anniversary approaches, I’m finally writing about that trip! I’ve written about some special trips over the years but this was the BIG one. This was a trip that spanned six weeks, four states and featured two weddings including my own!

I put together a draft post a while back that never saw the light of day but without writing an essay, one post was never going to do this trip justice! So I figured I’d throw a series of shorter posts at you!

“They’re still not going to be short are they Jason?”

Alright, you know me too well! I can’t help it! However if there was any trip worthy of a series of rambles then I suppose this is it!

Long time readers will be fairly familiar with much of the “story” at this point so let me give the rest of you a quick summarised version:

Way back in early 2016 I was invited over to Washington State to watch two friends (Maddie & Cassie) get married in the summer of 2018 – two days before my 30th birthday! Naturally I was going and had a big ol’ birthday trip!

Said friends played matchmakers and introduced me to Haleigh in the summer of 2016. We got chatting online and in 2017 I visited Washington State for the first time – one year earlier than planned!

We hit it off so many trips back and forth occurred before I went out to ‘live’ in the USA for 3 months at the start of February 2020!

“Wait.. 2020!?”

Yeah! In hindsight you could say it was bad timing, alternatively you could say it was perfect timing! I’ll let you be the judge of that and I suppose it depends on your perspective but we unexpectedly found ourselves living together in the midst of a pandemic. The intention had been to go over there and spend some proper time together and we certainly achieved that given the circumstances!

Anyway, by the time I’d left Washington I was an engaged man set to get married in September 2021. Alas that didn’t happen because I was stuck in England with the US border seemingly permanently closed and so here we are! Attempt number two!

All being well, this was finally happening! The end (HA!) to long distance was in sight! We’d finally be married and could live our lives (~~in limbo because of immigration laws)~~ together, happily ever after!

A lot of planning went in to this trip. Of course you had the wedding planning, the burden of which largely fell on Haleigh’s shoulders as she was the one in Washington and she did a great job!

Beyond that we also had the travel planning itself. We not only had our wedding but one of Haleigh’s cousins was getting married down in Utah three weeks later. Additionally we were still living in Covid-cautious travel times, plus the usual travel mishaps that crop up which made for some frustrating scenarios – all of which I’ll mention but I’ll end this post by giving you the rundown of what was to come.

The plan!
On Sunday 27th March I would travel to Walla Walla, via Seattle (2ish weeks before the wedding).
Saturday 9th April – get married
Saturday 23rd April – fly back to England. Arrive in London on Sunday 24th April.
Monday 25th April – back to work for three days
Thursday 28th April – fly to Salt Lake City via Denver – no direct flight to SLC, really!?
Saturday 30th April – attend Utah wedding
Sunday 1st May – fly home via Denver. Arrive in London on Monday (bank holiday!)
Tuesday 3rd May – back to work!

In hindsight it probably didn’t make the most sense but I ideally wanted to be in Washington two weeks before our wedding and I was also a bit conscious about my annual leave for the year. I struggled when I’d taken four weeks off in 2018, I didn’t really want any more than that so if I could save some days by working then I was all for it even if it wasn’t particularly convenient.

Naturally, it’s the big trips where things begin to go wrong. You’ll note that this was actually a six week trip so things went awry along the way. All of that is to come, this was just a quick introduction to an unforgettable trip.

Stay tuned!

Jason