Frenchman’s Reef & Morning Star Marriott Beach Resort St. Thomas U.S. Virgin Islands
Last week we watched a couple walk down the aisle on St. Thomas, in the U.S. Virgin Islands, and were reminded that having a destination wedding here is about as easy as it gets in the Caribbean—and pretty much anywhere in the world.
St. Thomas and the two other major U.S. Virgin Islands, St. John and St. Croix, along with their neighbor, Puerto Rico, are the only places in the Caribbean that Americans can visit without a passport. Which means that your destination wedding guests won’t have to go through the passport application process before deciding to accept your invitation, and that even the most forgetful of your gang (a category that has been known to include the groom) won’t risk missing their flight because they didn’t check one more time to see if they remembered everything.
Also, with the exception of St. John, which is a 20-45 minute ferry ride from St. Thomas, all these isles have direct air service from the U. S. mainland, so you won’t have to spend time wondering if all your luggage made it onto the puddle jumper.
Having been doing weddings for decades the double-named property Frenchman’s Reef & Morning Star Marriott Beach Resort (it was once two separate hotels) is particularly good at knowing how to make things go smoothly. And while it’s unlikely you’d be able to fill the resort’s Grand Harbour Ballroom, which can accommodate up to 1,400 people, the on-site wedding specialists are adept at helping you decide what other ceremony venues might work for you.
We witnessed two weddings during our stay (the resort does about 200 a year), one at the Garden Wedding Gazebo, a lush hideaway with a cliff-top view of the Caribbean, and the other on Morning Star Beach. The couples could also have chosen the Seaside Room, whose terrace overlooking St. Thomas Harbour can accommodate up to 100 people. Or, especially suited for sunrise and sunset ceremonies, the resort’s newest venue, where cannons used to be mounted, Battery Point, which overlooks the harbor entrance.
Another of Frenchman’s Reef & Morning Star Marriott Beach Resort’s allures is that it can accommodate guests who’ve got money to burn, as well as those for whom a Caribbean trip is a rare splurge. It offers wedding groups a block of less expensive rooms at a discounted rate, but then allows guests who want a higher category of accommodation to upgrade, also at a special price.
With a 4,000 square foot spa on property, and activities ranging from sea turtle encounters, to kayaking, to a dinner sail aboard a 54-foot catamaran, to day-trips to St. John, keeping your guests occupied is easy, too. Add sunshine, tradewinds, and aquamarine seas, and your wedding might just be the best — and easiest to arrange — vacation your friends have had in years.
Garden Wedding Gazebo overlooks the Caribbean
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Want to know more about planning destination wedding travel to Frenchman’s Reef & Morning Star Marriott Beach Resort or any other Caribbean location? Our travel partners at Coastline Travel Advisors, a Virtuoso agency, are ready to help.
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