If you think traffic in your neck of the woods is bad, spare a thought for Isle of Wight couple Jason and Briana Gilliam.
Traffic on England’s largest island was so bad on their wedding day last week, they ended up sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic – for nearly six hours!
Located south-east of Hampshire in the English Channel, the Isle of Wight is only accessible by ferry or bridge. Unfortunately, two bridge closures were scheduled for their Saturday wedding day, which left them sitting in traffic for hours between closures as they tried to get back onto the island.
“I was not in a good mood when I got there,” Briana told wavy.com. “There was a lot of silence after a while,” added her new husband.
“There really was,” says Briana. “Because there was nothing you could do but get frustrated with the whole situation.”
The day started badly, with the bride-to-be fainting the morning of the wedding and ending up in a mainland Emergency room. As long as the couple got back to the Isle of Wight by 6pm, however, everything would be OK.
“We left about 3:30 p.m…” said Jason. “We moved five blocks in about an hour.” Of course, everyone on the island was in the same, erm, boat…
“Our minister called us and was like ‘Hey, do you want to catch the ferry? It might not be everybody’s idea,’ and we were wrong, obviously,” said the groom.
Of course, by now, the reality that they may just miss their own wedding was starting to settle in.
“At one point my sisters called me and said, ‘If you have the minister with you, you should just get married on the side of the road and you’d have a great story,'” said Jason. “But, my mom would have killed both of us.”
So, they waited – another four or so hours.
The not-so-happy couple finally arrived at the reception venue arround 11pm. Briana had just enough time to put on her dress and greet the 50 or so guests who had been waiting patiently.
“We still got to do the ceremony and have our first dance and dance with our parents and everything,” said Briana. “But we were so exhausted. We were just ready to get home.”
And home they went, ready for their big honeymoon which, ironically, was a cruise!
