::the wedding :: venue :: kageneko.net

Venue

Originally, Jason and I chose the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens for the wedding, mostly because of cost since we thought we were paying for it. Unfortunately, as it turned out, it was too far away (3 hours north) and my work schedule didn't allow me time to travel up there to work out the details.

We started to search for other locations. We looked at some of the parks in San Francisco and decided to check Hornblower Cruises and Events, thinking we couldn't afford it. We were floored to found out that their packages were pretty much all inclusive and for a wedding the size of ours, pretty affordable. We also love water and have a very strong affinity for the San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Ocean. This option turned out to be even better than the gardens we originally chose.

Because our wedding had only 31 guests, we booked the Captain Hornblower, a small yacht. We had the option of departing from Berkeley or San Francisco. We chose Berkeley because of the ease of parking.

We held the ceremony on the lawn of the Berkeley Marina Doubletree Hotel and the reception on the boat. Samantha and Shana at Hornblower were amazing, handling everything for us as we made decisions. Hornblower handled food, drink, the cake, and provided a cruise for 3 and a half hours on the San Francisco Bay. How cool is that?

It must be pretty cool since I still get complements on how unique and fun our wedding was!