Wedding Blog
Image of Padova, Italy
Mr. Canary and I booked our honeymoon!!! Well, the most essential part. We had been considering honeymoon options for a long time and knew two things:
We both love to bike ride. It was even featured on our attendant invites. We’re not hardcore by any means so when I stumbled on the Bike Riders travel site, I was ecstatic! It’s a mix of everything we want - intimate inns/hotels, engaging tours that include cooking classes and gallery viewings, and best of all you bike to each of your destinations.
You can choose tours that suit your level. You may ask, Why would you want to go on a group tour on your honeymoon? Well, the beauty of it is that even though you start off as a group (maximum of 16 people) you never ride as a group. You’re given the destination for the day and you can Tour de France it or take your sweet ass time to get there. So really, you bike separately from everyone else. For those who want a more tailored experience, they also have private tours specifically for certain places you may want to visit that aren’t offered as a group tour.
The company is super responsive and even sent us a whole packet with sample itineraries. Their site is super easy to use and the pictures are enough to make you want to get on a plane today! Mr. C and I deliberated for a while and decided there is nothing that is more us… we love trying new foods and seeing new places. But we still had to decide where to go since Bike Riders offers tours to so many places all around the world.
Mr. C and I have talked about various destinations, but we always come back to Italy because it’s very significant to us. I studied in Padova, Italy for a summer in college and really fell in love with the town. I had visited Italy before, but never really immersed myself in the day-to-day life like I did when living there. I lived with a widow who spoke very little English and her dog Perla. I walked down cobblestone streets and through arcades to get to class. I cooked dinner with my host mom and she taught me Italian words by pointing to various ingredients in the meal. After dinner, I often met with my friends and we laid out in the grassy square in the center of town with bottles of prosecco and yummy Italian snacks recounting our days and planning weekend trips. It was really magical and I felt so blissful. It was one of the happiest times of my life. It was made even more special when Mr. C visited for a week and we traveled to Florence and Ferrara. In Ferrara, we saw one of the best Radiohead concerts performed in an old Italian piazza. I’ve never rocked out so hard in my entire life! So Italy definitely holds a very special place in our relationship.
One of my wedding fantasies was to rent out a large Italian villa and invite our closest family and friends to a small intimate wedding… but with my large family, picking and choosing invitees would have been difficult.
So instead, we’ll opt for an intimate, yet engaging honeymoon in Italy. That doesn’t sound like a bad compromise at all! Now all we have to do is get our butts in shape for the tour!
A view of some of the sites we’ll be passing on the tour we selected…
{All image from www.bikeridertours.com}
How did you decide on where to go for your honeymoon? Did anyone else decide to do a more interactive/adventure honeymoon?
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Oh that looks SO amazing!!! I’ve never been to Italy, but it’s definitely top on my list of places to go. The scenery, the wine, the cheese, the desserts– it’s basically my idea of heaven 
You’re going to have an amazing time– I cannot wait to hear all about it.
So beautiful…that first picture almost looks surreal.
We choose a journey honeymoon instead of a destination one. We kept it close to home, but someplace(s) we had never been before. The Oregon coast was beautiful and it was my first real road trip. Part of me wishes I could have gone someplace overseas, but one of my requirements was that I not sit in a plane to kick off our vacation. I’ll get there someday though!
FI and I are planning 2 weeks in Italy for our honeymoon. We have been looking for a way to incorporate biking into at least part of the trip, as we’re both getting ready to start training for a century next month! Thanks for the site tip!!
We’re going to Lake Como in Italy. It’s beautiful out there. Initially my SO wanted to go to France (mostly to track part of his family origins) but he wanted to visit Italy too so compromised. We’re going to France for our 1 year anniversary. My father lived in Italy while he attended school there so I guess it’s in the genes.
Oh my goodness, that site is amazing! I’m drooling over the Nantucket/Martha’s Vineyard tour…maybe next summer, if I can get Mr. Magnolia to agree!
And the Berkshires/Southern VT tour? Totally stops in the town where I grew up. I love it!
we are! we’re heading to alaska for some whale watching, salmon fishing, zip lining, and glacier kayaking. italy was a close runner up though. =)
A friend of mine and his mother did a trip like this over the summer. They went through ‘BACKROADS’ and had nothing but wonderful things to say. My hubby and I are both very active and into road biking so we ordered their tour catalog. We’ve been drooling ever since! Although the trips are pricey they look totally worth it! Maybe for our 5 or 10 year wedding anniversary we’ll go on one!
As for our honeymoon we also wanted a mix of relaxing and adventure. We chose Costa Rica and were not disappointed. I think the only ‘adventure’ we didn’t do was kayaking in an estuary 
Next time!
I think if we had known about these biking trips we may have picked that instead - I can’t wait to hear about your trip!!
I want to go on a 3 week honeymoon! Padova looks beautiful!
wow. thank you so much for pointing out this site! we haven’t started planning our fall 08 honeymoon yet, but this is exactly the type of thing we’ve talked about doing. my grandmother was from Sicily and i’ve always dreamed of going there- this would be such an amazing way to see it. when is your honeymoon? i can’t wait to hear about it!
We planned our honeymoon in Costa Rica during the rainy season. Well it was extra rainy this year when we went and most of our activities were cancelled (horseback riding, sea kayaking, and white water rafting) but we did get to go on a zipline canopy tour. CR was beautiful and the dollar does better there than in Europe. I would definitely suggest going there but maybe not during the rainy season. 
Your trip looks amazing! Italy would have been one of our top choices but #1 money & #2 not enough vacation time (we went to Japan earlier this year) I also enjoyed your story living with your host mom & dog!
We chose a cruise that visited [mostly] places neither of us had ever been. We did take a LOT of group tours, but we figured that was the best way to see the sights around the various ports. In three towns, the guides gave us a lot of extra attention based on our age and attentiveness–one would send us off to additional sights on our own while we waited for the older members of the tour to take a bathroom break (”Where are the youngsters? Go down that alley two blocks, and turn left! We’ll be here another ten minutes. Run!”)
well done! We’ll wait for you! i’m italian and live in bologna (an hour from padova) and can tell you you’re doing right! you should come here as well on our beautiful “colli bolognesi”.
i’m also thinking about my honeymoon as i’m getting married on may24. padova is defenitely too close for us to feel on holiday though…
ciaooO!
this sounds like an amaaaazing honeymoon. i’d love to do something like this with mr. bee!
Thanks everyone! All your trips sound like so much fun. We’re so psyched! It’ll be the most we’ve ever biked.
Miss Magnolia: We LOVE the Berkshires. We’ve actually gone every summer for the past four years to spend a weekend at the amazing Porches Inn in North Adams and do stuff like Tanglewood and bike through Cheshire and stop at various farm stands to refill on calories.
nikkinicole: We’re going in the fall. We didn’t want to be in Italy during peak tourist season or when it was too hot. Biking in the heat is not fun, especially in hilly towns! We also wanted some time in between the wedding and honeymoon to recalibrate.
Laura: Ciao! My host mom’s daughter studied at Bologna and often told me a lot about it! I plan on stopping at Bologna as well as Siena. I do miss Italy very much and I can’t wait to go back. I secretly wished I could live there for 6 months of the year!
Mrs. Bee: You should definitely do it! But I will have to tell you if I survive first.
[...] Five Boro also got us really excited for our honeymoon, which of course includes lots of biking (and eating!) It was nice to take a break from our massive [...]
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Mrs. Canary, New York
Age and Occupation: 24, Marketing
Fiance's Age and Occupation: 25, Journalist/Editor
Engagement Date: February 16, 2007
Wedding Date: July, 2008
Blogging Since: October 19, 2007
Venue: Pier Sixty, Chelsea Piers
About Me: I'm a born and raised New Yorker who loves all things crafty and artsy, food (cheese and dessert!), magazines, and shoes. I'm a power shopper always on the lookout for good deals or great quality-- sometimes I'm lucky and I find both! I love to dance and "shake what my momma gave me" but can also really enjoy a quiet night in with Mr. Canary and a good episode of Seinfeld or curl up with a good book.
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