Wayne & Alison: A Highland Wedding on the Black Water at Garve
Some couples plan a wedding and then a honeymoon. Wayne and Alison did it the other way around. They spent time exploring the North-West Highlands first, travelling the NC500, and then came back to the River Black Water at Garve at the tail end of their holiday to get married. It is a quietly brilliant way of approaching things, and entirely in keeping with a couple who had clearly decided to do this entirely on their own terms.
It was a very small ceremony, just the two of them, with my husband and son as witnesses. For couples who want to keep things genuinely personal, this is always a good solution, and I will quietly take some credit for the fact that my husband and son make excellent witnesses. Years of training.
We met at the car park and made our way to a location we had scouted beforehand, a beautiful spot on the river that was quiet and private and exactly right for this kind of occasion. September in the Highlands can be unpredictable, but the weather that day was something to be grateful for: proper early autumn sunshine, the kind that makes the water and the hills look their very best.
Monika was absolutely wonderful and we couldn’t have asked for a better celebrant for our wedding at Blackwater Falls.
From the beginning she completely understood that we wanted a simple, relaxed and very personal ceremony with no fuss. On the day she made us both feel completely at ease and the ceremony was exactly what we had hoped for — warm, meaningful and still very much us.
She also went above and beyond with all the practical arrangements, including travelling to our rather unusual location and helping with our witnesses, which made planning an elopement from hundreds of miles away so much easier.
We had the most fantastic day (with Scotland even providing blue skies and sunshine!) and Monika was a huge part of it.
Alison & Wayne
The ceremony was built around the theme of navigation, which sounds like it might be a well-worn wedding metaphor but in this case was genuinely the right one. These are two people who between them cover a great deal of ground: one who likes knowing the route in advance, one who reads the conditions and knows when to adjust, and both of them perfectly capable of giving each other space without losing sight of the direction they are travelling in together. Ten years of finding their way to this point, with plenty of detours, decisions and a shared sense of humour that seems to function as their most reliable compass.
The promises were made, the rings exchanged, and the quaich was shared. The sun stayed out. And then they were husband and wife.
Congratulations, Wayne and Alison. Whatever the map brings next, you seem well equipped for it.
Eloping to Scotland is a dream come true for many couples... read more about what to expect during a Highland elopement.