Without doubt we were glad to be getting out of Alabama, and after a quick stop at the fascinating Jack Daniels Distillery in Lynchburg we continued onwards to Nashville, Tennessee. I am stopping short of writing about Nashville since it was agreed that we would return and get a more thorough flavor of the musical mecca. From Nashville we headed east for perhaps the most important day of my life; to marry my fiancé.
Savannah, Georgia and getting married
A year earlier I had taken the kids for a miniature tour of Georgia. One of the places we stumbled across was Savannah. It is a mesmerizing pocket of sleepy trees and squares draped in beauty that lived with me long after we had left.
Switch forward to this year and I was driving through the Nevada desert, bored, and my phone rings. “Let’s get married”. I was stunned, immediately agreeing to the ad hoc proposal by my fiancé Gemma.
Getting married in Georgia is simple and quick. Foreign citizens must first visit the county court in which they are getting married. For us, getting married in Savannah, GA it was Chatham county court. You must pay a fee of $65 and wait around 15 minutes to get your marriage license. Once you have that you are free to marry. In Georgia you can marry anywhere, in any park, on any beach without needing to get a permit. However, if more than 10 guests are to be present you are advised to get one. Since we were effectively eloping, there was no need for anything or anyone other than someone to marry us, and a photographer to document our day.
We used a company called ‘elope to Savannah’ for our wedding and really, though everything went well in the end it is hard to recommend them due to the fact absolutely every aspect of our day had to be chased up.
Getting married was life changing. I had found a woman whom I had fallen in love with and who had loved me in return. I won’t document our day since it was ours, and special to us. But now, as I write this on a flight to Kuala Lumpur almost exactly 8 weeks to the day, it remains one of the best days of my life and once which I will never forget.
Florida and wrapping up
Our ‘honeymoon’ if you like, was spent in Florida having some hard-core Disney time with the two youngest, Jack and Toby. Charlie and Abi had returned to the UK for school and the four of us were left spending days in Disney and loving the Florida sunshine. That time encompassed three weeks during which we loved life, and which will be documented in future posts which detail Disney, how to do it, the mistakes to avoid and how to make the most of your time in the sunshine state.
But for now I draw to a close the summer of 2015. From it we all gained something a little different, we all learned something new, and we arrived back in the UK a bigger, stronger, more determined family than ever.
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