Success!!! After many, many, many hours in the car and about nine different wedding venues, we have found the perfect place for our wedding! We were anxious to go ahead and secure a location as we knew we wanted to get married in May (one of the two most popular wedding months in North Carolina), and we knew we wanted to get married at a vineyard. Since Dan proposed at a wine cellar and we both preferred an outdoor location, a vineyard seemed the perfect fit. So we set out with a list of venues that weren’t too far away and that claimed to be “great” spots for weddings. However, we quickly found out the word great was loosely used. The first vineyard was actually just a field with vines that were completely bare. They had just held a vineyard-warming party, so the badminton net and brightly colored Christmas lights made it difficult to imagine a classy, moonlit wedding reception. We actually couldn’t help but laugh when we got out of the car. But that was only the start; each new vineyard brought with it new problems: too small, on the highway, way out of our budget, actually just a trailer, etc. And with each vineyard being about an hour apart, it was hard not to get discouraged.
Luckily, there was one last place we were waiting to see. It was a vineyard in the middle of Chapel Hill and Wilmington, one which Dan had passed countless times on his way to UNC. The name? Duplin Vineyards. We actually knew the events planner there, so we woke up early last weekend and made the drive out to meet her. Thankfully, it was absolutely perfect! Lush, beautiful vineyards, large enough for everyone we want to invite, with a quaint pond and barn shelter. We’re really excited about the location and now that we have a wedding venue we can’t wait to get the planning in motion! So stay tuned because it’s official: Friday, May 20th we will be saying our vows and celebrating afterward at Duplin Vineyards in Rose Hill, NC!
