Second thoughts at the altar, feuding relatives at the reception and bridesmaids' dresses that don't quite cut it in the fashion stakes are more familiar culprits of a ruined wedding. But when your big day is called off because of a fuel crisis, there isn't much you can do other than shrug and say "c'est la vie", Rachel Donnelly reports.
As motorists waited in queues at petrol stations yesterday Barbara Broad (47) and James Hunt (46) were forced to abandon plans to tie the knot. It wasn't that the vicar couldn't make it but because James's son, Tom, who was to cook the wedding breakfast, was out of petrol.
To add to their problems, many of the guests who planned to drive to the wedding ceremony at Southam village hall in Gloucestershire, also ran out of fuel and said they couldn't attend.
The couple, who are both counsellors and live in Cheltenham in Gloucestershire, have re-arranged their wedding for October 14th. But they have said they now face financial difficulties because they had already ["]paid["]
for the ceremony through a bartering scheme. The novel payment scheme meant the couples' friends had already offered to supply cakes, decorations for the hall and the awning for the reception in exchange for counselling sessions and Indian head massages.
A philosophical Barbara explained that the wedding would still go ahead, despite all the difficulties: "We have had to do lots of ringing around as guests were coming from as far afield as Essex and Winchester.
"We decided we would have to postpone when Tom said he couldn't get the shopping or petrol to get here. We are not too disappointed as we have just postponed, not cancelled."