Shutdown closes Grand Canyon to weddings
You think you’ve planned for everything, even a back-up indoor venue if it rains. And then the government shuts down, closing all 401 national parks, monuments, and historic sites across the country, including the one where you’d planned to have your wedding.
In Yosemite, eight weddings were scheduled for this coming weekend. At the National Mall in Washington, nine were planned for the week. At the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, 11 wedding permits had been issued for the first two weeks of October; at Great Smoky Mountain National Park, the number was 28.
“It’s really unfortunate. This is not a situation you’d want to be in as a bride,” Lisa Cesaro, a spokesperson for the company that runs the resorts at Yosemite, told USA Today, one of the many national news sources that ran a story on the effect of the shutdown on weddings.
If you are a bride whose plans have been upended by park closings, our suggestion, since travel plans have already been made, is to look for a hotel not far outside the park that might offer a suitable substitute venue. Here are our choices for three of the more popular parks:
Yosemite
Just a few miles outside the southern entrance to the park, the 244-room Tenaya Lodge can offer just about any service a bride would need and has enough activities, from horseback riding to white-water rafting to keep your guest’s minds off the shortcomings of government.
Grand Canyon
From what we’ve been hearing, couples who were planning to marry at the Grand Canyon, usually because of the beauty of their surroundings, are heading just over two hours south to the red rocks of Sedona. L’Auberge de Sedona has nine wedding ceremony venues, some with red-rock views, some alongside a bubbling creek.
Great Smoky Mountains
We hesitate to recommend Blackberry Farm as a substitute for anything, because it has been long known as one of the best small hotels in America. But if you have decided, after the shutdown fiasco, to say the heck with it and pull out all the stops, this may be your place. It won’t be cheap, but it will be mountain luxury, set amid its own 4,200 acres.
