‘Mini-moons’ give couples a vacation appetizer – USA Today
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After Kylie and Jacob Kemper got married in June in York, Pa., the newlyweds took only two days to unwind at a bed-and-breakfast on Deep Creek Lake in Maryland. Having closed on a house a month before their wedding, the couple was looking for an inexpensive way to celebrate their nuptials, so they planned a “mini-moon” to the scenic Lake Pointe Inn.
“We really wanted to take a full-blown honeymoon to a tropical all-inclusive resort,” said Kylie, 25. “We met with a travel agent and everything, but in the end we had to allocate our money to other things.”
Today, roughly 82% of newlyweds take a mini-moon after their wedding, according to The Knot’s 2016 Romance Travel Study. A typical mini-moon consists of a two- to five-day romantic getaway that’s within close proximity by drive or flight to a couple’s home or wedding venue, says Kristen Maxwell Cooper, editor in chief at The Knot.
“We saw mini-moons emerge in the early 2000s, but they’ve really taken off in the last five years,” adds Lisa Gooder, executive director of editorial at Brides magazine.
Most mini-moons are domestic jaunts, says Anne Chertoff, a contributing editor at WeddingWire.com. “You don’t want to spend an entire day in the car or on an airplane if you’re only going away for a few days,” Chertoff says.
For many couples, however, the mini-moon is a prelude to a longer, traditional honeymoon. “People frequently take a mini-moon in addition to a honeymoon, not instead of,” Chertof explains.
Here, five couples share their mini-moon experiences.
A much-needed mental break
After Erin and Kevin White, 35 and 37, said “I do” this past May in Bloomington, Ind., the couple was exhausted from a year’s worth of wedding planning. “We couldn’t envision ourselves planning an epic vacation alongside a wedding,” says Erin.
The couple wanted to honeymoon in Mexico, but “the thought of getting on a plane for a 12-hour travel day right after our wedding reception makes me shudder,” Erin says. Instead, they drove two hours to nearby Madison, Ind., for a few days of RR and antique shopping. “We brought leftover wedding cake and champagne to enjoy each night,” Erin says. The three-day trip only cost about $600, including food, drinks, lodging and souvenirs.
Next month, the couple will honeymoon in Isla Mujeres, a Mexican island in the Caribbean Sea. “Planning this trip has been enjoyable and fun, and a lot of it is due to the fact we took a mini-moon,” says Erin.
A big money-saver
Jordan and Brent Bath, 26 and 27, weren’t looking for the kind of lavish cruise or five-star resort that many couples dream of when they picture their honeymoon. When the couple got married in January 2015, “We were 23, fresh out of college, and the last thing we wanted to do was start out our married life in debt by paying for an outrageous honeymoon,” Jordan says.
That led the couple to take a mini-moon in Austin, a short flight from their home in Omaha. “We opted for culture, food and fantastic museums,” Jordan says. “It was perfect.” The four-day trip cost about $1,500 including airfare, hotel, food and activities.
“When people ask where we went for our honeymoon, it seems they’re expecting someplace tropical, so when we tell them Austin they get quite a puzzled look on their faces,” Jordan says. “We love explaining all the awesome food trucks we tried, hikes we went on, and amazing nightlife that can only happen in Texas.”
A matter of timing
A number of couples choose their wedding date based on when they want to go on honeymoon, says Chertoff, but not Hanna and Ryan Thornton, 30 and 31, who got married in Miami two years ago.
“I knew I wanted to get married in the winter months,” says Hanna. “It’s way too hot [in Miami] in the summer.” However, the couple’s January wedding wasn’t timed well with the Mediterranean cruise they wanted for their honeymoon. “We couldn’t go to Europe right after our wedding because it would be too cold, so we waited until summer for our real honeymoon,” Hanna says.
After their wedding, the Thorntons took a two-night mini-moon across the state in St. Pete Beach, an island off of Saint Petersburg. “I think I would have had the ‘post-wedding blues’ if everything just went back to normal the next day,” Hanna says.
A work-friendly option
For some people, a mini-moon simply makes sense from a job perspective. After all, “if you took time off before your wedding, you may not have as much vacation time available as you’d like for a full-blown honeymoon,” Gooder points out.
So was the case with Dana and James O’Malley, 29 and 30, who got married two years ago in Brooklyn, N.Y. The couple planned to go to Thailand for a two-and-a-half-week honeymoon, but they needed to accrue more vacation days before they could take the time off from work. To tide them over, the O’Malleys went for a short mini-moon in Montauk on Long Island.
Amber and Chad Whaley, 30 and 35, also decided to take a mini-moon for work reasons. When the couple got married in northern Ohio last year, Amber — an ER nurse — had to wait a few months before she could take time off for a 12-day honeymoon in Europe. For their mini-moon, the Whaleys went on a four-day road trip to Canada — stopping in Toronto before going to Niagara Falls. The trip cost about $1,200, plus, “it added a time buffer for us to save a little money before the real honeymoon,” Chad says.
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