Minimoon in Mendoza, Argentina

I first heard of the term "minimoon" a few years ago, and I'm pretty sure it made me roll my eyes - yet another way that weddings are getting more and more ridiculously complex and making people part with even more money, I thought to myself.

However, a few years on, following my own wedding in December 2024, I in fact did end up having a minimoon myself, though kind of by accident!

Despite living in Chile for most of his life, my husband Claudio had actually never been to Argentina before, and seeing as we had a couple of weeks left in Chile after our wedding, we decided to take the opportunity to go on a little trip over the border to the city of Mendoza.

I got on to the task of booking a hotel on Hotels.com, and discovered that I had two promotions available to me: Member Prices reduced the price of most hotels by a large percentage, and I also had £73 of OneKeyCash built up that I could apply to my reservation. We had a think, and eventually decided that in order to celebrate our recent marriage, we should book the fanciest 5-star hotel in the city, the Park Hyatt Mendoza. This hotel would have been around £220 for a night, but with the two promotions applied, it worked out at less than £90 - still more than we'd generally spend on a hotel (we usually go for budget hotels, like Ibis), but an amazing deal for what we were getting. So that was how we ended up having a rather fancy minimoon!

We decided to go by car, as the journey between Santiago and Mendoza is really picturesque with several interesting sights to see along the way. I took this journey by bus in 2023, and enjoyed it a lot, though I wished I could stop, get out and look at some places more closely. Of course, in the car, we were able to do just that, starting with Laguna del Inca, a lagoon high up in the Chilean Andes, right next to the border with Argentina.

Interestingly, there is actually an Inca legend based around this lagoon. It is said that an Inca king's wife was buried there and that the colour of her eyes turned the water emerald green. Supposedly, you can occasionally still hear the king crying with grief at night...

Despite the spooky legend, the lagoon is a very beautiful place, and very peaceful at this time of year (it gets busier in winter when people come up there to ski). Apparently, you can go kayaking on the water - something we'd like to try in the future!

After crossing into Argentina, we arrived at Parque Provincial Aconcagua, where we could park the car, and walk for a few minutes to a viewpoint, in order to look at the tallest mountain in the western hemisphere, Mount Aconcagua. It's hard to appreciate how tall it is from this distance, but it's still incredible to know that you're looking at the highest point in the world outside of the Himalayas.

We then drove to the official border crossing, which was where we hit a problem. Though we ourselves passed through customs with no issues, the car was not allowed through, as it apparently had an unpaid motorway tax from 2017. We knew this was an error, as Claudio had recently paid all the car's taxes, and there certainly wasn't an outstanding one from 2017 - obviously, it hadn't been correctly cleared from the system at the time when it was paid. But as it was Sunday, we couldn't phone up to ask about the error, so there was nothing we could do. We were beginning to think that we would have to give up our trip, but then one of the customs officers told us we could leave the car at the border, and pay to go the rest of the way in a bus if there were any spare seats. Fortunately, there was a bus just about to leave which had two seats free, so we did get to Mendoza after all! Unfortunately, we couldn't stop at Puente del Inca or Potrerillos Dam as planned, but the important thing is that we got there.

Once we arrived at the bus station in Mendoza, the first thing we did was book our return tickets for the following night. Frustratingly, we had to pay a full price ticket, even though we were only going to be doing less than half of the journey, which did make the trip as a whole a lot more expensive than we were expecting.

But once we got to our hotel, all the stresses of the day melted away. The Park Hyatt Mendoza was definitely one of the most special places we've ever stayed in! It's located right in the heart of the city, in front of Plaza Independencia, and is an absolutely beautiful building.

Our room was also pretty special. It was so spacious (the bathroom was like three rooms in one!) and had all the nice extras you get in a posh hotel, like dressing gowns, fancy toiletries and a Nespresso machine. I think it was my fourth time staying in a 5-star hotel and Claudio's first, so it was really a cut above what we're used to, and we definitely made the most of it!

After settling into our room, we were pretty hungry, as all we'd had to eat all day were the road trip snacks we'd packed - we'd planned to buy a lunch from the vendors at the border, but couldn't in the end, as we'd had to quickly jump on the bus.

Fortunately, in Mendoza, there's a lot of good food to enjoy. As a country, Argentina has a lot of Italian food, as most people there have some Italian ancestry, so we decided to go to a nearby Italian place, Pizzaiolo, where I had pizza and Claudio had an Argentinian steak.

Afterwards, Claudio went for a walk around Plaza Independencia, but I had stomach pains from the long day of travelling, so went back to the hotel for a soak in the bath and a cup of tea in the big, comfy bed. A nice way to end the day!

Our bus back to the border was at 22:00, which meant that we had pretty much the entirety of the following day to enjoy the hotel and the city. We started off with a delicious breakfast at a café called Chiamo, where we had avocado and eggs on toast, freshly squeezed orange juice, Argentinian coffee and a medialuna.

Following a little walk around Plaza Chile, one of the city's squares, we went back to the hotel to pack up our things and check out. But luckily for us, even after checking out, we still had the rest of the day to use the hotel's facilities, including the swimming pool and spa! So we spent a few very happy hours making the most of that!

For lunch, Claudio wanted to try milanesa, a typical dish from Argentina. However, he didn't realise quite how massive the portion was going to be! I had cannelloni, which was also pretty huge but very nice!

We then spent the rest of the day exploring the city on foot, including its squares, avenues, train station and Parque General San Martín. Given that we walked many kilometres, of course we also had to stop for gelato at Famiglia Perin! 

I didn't take many photos, as it was my third time in Mendoza (I first went in 2018 and visited for a second time in 2023), so I could just enjoy the experience of being there. To be honest, I hadn't really enjoyed my first trip there that much; I went on a big coach tour in the middle of winter, and we spent a lot of the time being shuttled from one photo spot to the next (most of which, I didn't find that impressive) and getting on and off the bus. We also stayed in the most horrible hostel imaginable, which didn't help matters! 

The second time I went was a solo trip in order to renew my Chilean visa, and although I had a strange and slightly scary experience of being harassed by another guest in my hotel on my first night there, it was overall a much more pleasant trip. I realised that Mendoza is a city that is perfect for strolling around and relaxing, particularly in the warmer months. I think it's a city that grows on you over time; it's not somewhere with lots of famous landmarks or super Instagrammable streets, but it's a great place to have some good food and drink and take things a bit more slowly.

I actually felt quite sad when it was time to collect our luggage from the hotel and head for the bus station, as I didn't feel like leaving Mendoza just yet - though that probably had quite a lot to do with not wanting to leave the Park Hyatt!

In any case, the bus ride to the border may not have been a 5-star hotel, but it wasn't as far off as you might expect! The seats were huge and could be reclined 180 degrees (why they don't offer this on long-haul flights, I can't understand), and so we dozed off easily during the couple of hours' journey to the border.

We were woken up by the bus attendant around midnight and dropped off on the side of the road to go and collect the car. Fortunately the journey home was smooth sailing, and we arrived back in our Airbnb in Santiago in the early hours of Christmas Eve, tired but very happy!

Overall, I found it was a really nice idea to have a minimoon - it was great to have a (mostly!) relaxing time away together and to treat ourselves with a luxurious hotel stay for the special occasion. I also think it makes sense to have a smaller, lower key trip straight after the wedding and to have the big honeymoon later, which is what we're going to be doing. We did consider going straight from Chile to another destination after the wedding, but I'm glad we decided against it, as it would have been a pretty full-on itinerary. Plus, it's nice to spread out the festivities and have our honeymoon to look forward to for a couple of months! So maybe I'll take back my initial eye roll over the minimoon trend (though I'll still retain it for anyone who flies abroad for several days and calls that a "minimoon" - that's definitely a honeymoon in my book!)

Following our arrival back in Chile, we had another week left to enjoy the sunshine, as well as Christmas with Claudio's family. In total we spent three weeks in South America, and I plan to publish a write-up of what we got up to outside of our wedding and trip to Argentina, very soon, right here on this blog!

Our Wedding in Quintero, Chile

Reader, I married him!

After six and a half years together, including one and a half years in a civil union, Claudio and I finally tied the knot on the 14th December 2024 in Quintero, Chile. We held our ceremony at Yachting Hotel Quintero, where we were married in front of the Pacific Ocean, in the presence of 47 of our family and friends, plus several more over Zoom. It really was the most beautiful and perfect day!

We were initially planning to get married in England, and were even at the stage of choosing a venue, when we discovered that we were unable to get married in the UK because of the fact we were a heterosexual couple in a civil union (which we entered into for practical reasons, always with the intention of converting it to a marriage at a later date). That left us with three options: have a non-legally binding wedding in the UK and just pretend to be married afterwards, though we would technically still be in a civil union; dissolve the civil union in order to get married in the UK; or get married in Chile. The third option was definitely the most preferable, but sadly, we knew that it would make it very difficult for my mum and dad, or any of our family and friends from the UK to attend.

However, on later reflection, I do actually feel that Chile was always the best option, and the wedding itself really confirmed that to me. For starters, Claudio has a bigger family and more friends than me, so it was nice to have a big celebration with all of them, especially as we're going to be living over here in the UK for at least the next two years so won't get to see them very often. Aside from that, I've always really liked the idea of having a beach wedding somewhere sunny, and that's not particularly easy to do in England! Claudio was definitely more into the idea of an English country wedding than I was - the main reason I wanted to get married in the UK was just so my parents could be there - but from the moment we saw Yachting Hotel Quintero on matrimonios.cl (a Chilean wedding planning website), we both knew it was our dream venue.

It was challenging at times to plan our wedding from afar; though Claudio had a few months in Chile last year sorting out his UK visa, I never actually visited the venue until the day before the wedding! Thankfully, we had a lot of help from my in-laws, especially my mother-in-law Ivonne, to get things organised, and then in the week before the big day, it was all hands on deck to finalise all the little details. In the end, the day went even better than we could have imagined, and we were so happy. The only thing missing was the fact that my parents couldn't be there in person, but at least we were able to live stream the ceremony and chat with them a bit afterwards. We're also planning to have some sort of celebration here and take photos with them at some point in the next few months, which we're looking forward to.

So, with all that said, now it's time to get into some photos! This is how our wedding weekend played out...

The Day Before

We loaded up the car and drove to Quintero from our Airbnb in Santiago early in the morning, where we met up with Claudio's parents for our "manifestación" in the registry office at 11 am. The manifestación is basically where they check all your documents are in order so that everything runs smoothly in the wedding ceremony the following day. Once that was done, we went over to the hotel to unload the cars and check into our room. We had our room specially decorated for the occasion, which I absolutely loved! Plus, the view was stunning.

The afternoon was taken up with last minute preparations, such as putting together our favours and going to buy photo frames from the local Chinese mall for our cake table. But we had a nice evening together afterwards in the hotel restaurant. One of several nontraditional aspects of our wedding was the fact that neither of us had a hen/stag party, so it was good to have a little celebration by ourselves before the wedding. We had been given a voucher for a free pisco sour each, which we took advantage of, and we also had some food. Though vegetarian options were lacking, I ordered the vegetable and shellfish pasta without the shellfish, and it was really delicious!

Another non-traditional thing we did was staying in the same room the night before the wedding. I'm glad we did, because not only was it cheaper and easier, but we spent most of the following day apart before the wedding itself, so the moment we saw each other at the ceremony wasn't any less special.

The Big Day

Claudio and I said goodbye to each other at around 11:00, after my hair and makeup artist, Bárbara arrived. Ivonne, Bárbara and I went up to mine and Claudio's room to get ready, while Claudio went down to his parents' room.

We had a nice relaxing afternoon getting ready and listening to music, but at around 16:30, I started getting nervous. The wedding was meant to be at 17:00 and by 16:45, hardly anyone had arrived yet! I was watching through the net curtains, and could see Claudio going between the hotel and the beach several times looking nervous!

At last, at some point after 17:00, I was given the go ahead to go down to the ceremony, accompanied by Claudio's dad, who's also called Claudio, and Jackito the beagle!

The Ceremony

It's now time to start sharing some of our professional photos, taken by our photographer Alexis. I really love all these photos, and there are a lot of them, but I'll try to just share some favourites in order to not overload this post!

Walking down the aisle towards Claudio was such a special moment. When we met at the end of the aisle, it was very emotional for both of us, and definitely one of the parts of the day that will stay in our memories forever.

It was then time for us to get married! We said "I do" (or actually "Sí, quiero"), signed the papers, put on our rings with the help of Claudio's cousins Pascale and Baltazar, and that was it - it was official. We felt so much happiness to have finally made this huge commitment to each other for the rest of our lives.

This was where the celebration part of the day began, starting with drinks and canapés next to the swimming pool and photos with all our guests. We also had the chance to speak a bit with our guests on Zoom, including my mum and dad, my sister, brother-in-law and baby nephew, my friend Sophie, my aunt and uncle, my godfather, and some of Claudio's family and friends who couldn't make it in person.

Afterwards, our guests went into the dining room, while we had a photoshoot for just the two of us. These photos are some of my favourites!

The Wedding Reception

We entered the dining room, where we were asked to make our speeches straightaway. I hadn't been expecting to speak so soon, and with my nerves I forgot most of the notes I'd written earlier, but I managed to remember some of it in time! After we sat down, Sebastián from Eventos Cruces, our events planner, went round all the tables asking who wanted to make a speech, so several of our guests ended up speaking. I thought this was really nice compared to the UK tradition, where generally it is just the groom, the bride's dad and the best man who speak, which is quite old-fashioned.

Then the dinner was served. For most of the guests, it was ceviche, followed by beef with potatoes and vegetables, and then tiramisù and crème brûlée for dessert, but I had the vegetarian option of avocado and tomato salad for the starter and veggie meatballs instead of beef with the main course. It was all very delicious, especially the desserts!

The next stage of the night was the disco, which of course started with our first dance to the song Caminar de Tu Mano by Río Roma, a band we saw live at the Teletón in 2022. We hadn't practiced much beforehand, but I think it went okay!

Claudio had the idea of hiring a 360 degree camera for the party, which I wasn't really sure about, but now I have to admit it was a great idea. It gave people something to do other than dancing, and everyone had a lot of fun making videos with it!

One of the other highlights was of course cutting the cake. We had a little display next to the cake with photos of our loved ones who either couldn't be there in person (my mum, dad, sister, brother-in-law and nephew) or who had passed away (my cat Pickle and my Nana, and Claudio's grandmother, grandfather and great-grandmother).

I also did the traditional bouquet toss, whereas Claudio tossed a box of whisky (empty, obviously!).

Other than that, we all had fun dancing the night away!

The Day After

We were both super happy to wake up married for the first time! And now that the wedding was over, we finally had some free time to enjoy the hotel pool!

After checking out of the hotel, we had a nice day exploring some of Quintero's beaches, starting with Cueva Del Pirata (Pirate's Cave), where the water rushes in and out of a little cave.

Later in the day, we went to Playa Los Enamorados (The Lovers Beach) and Playa de Los Enamorados (also known as Las Conchitas - The Little Shells). These beaches are absolutely beautiful and have definitely gone straight into my list of my favourite beaches of all time.

We drove back to Santiago that evening, tired but very happy! Our wedding day was fantastic and we enjoyed it so much, but it was definitely a relief to not have to think about wedding planning anymore, and also just a great feeling to finally be properly married.

Here's to the rest of our lives together!