Friends and family from all over Australia gathered at the Gold Coast last weekend to celebrate the long awaited wedding of our dear friends David and Ro. Their timing was perfect - the wedding took place on Valentine's Day - so David will never be able to forget their anniversary in future!
It was a small gathering of friends and extended family - only 35 in total invited guests. We were lucky to be part of this special group - along with David's old friends Rosalie and Paul who live in Tasmania now. Our designated job was to get David "to the church on time".
In this case we had to get him to nearby Bilinga Beach for the ocean side ceremony. The weather was really uncertain on the day of the wedding and Ro had to make the call an hour or so before things were due to get underway. With still threatening skies she made the right call and everything was ready - truly a spectacular setting and no rain imminent (fingers crossed).
Everyone looked so happy to be a part of this love match.
David and his daughter Thea............
...... and his son Rhys and Clare.
.... and Rosalie took some great action shots of us - getting carried away by all the love in the air........
Ro made a stunning entrance on to the beach with daughter Claira .....
And things got under way. First there was a heartfelt Welcome to Country, the soulful sounds of the didgeridoo by the ocean and an original song performed in language by girl from the local Aboriginal community... just beautiful.
Ro's brother John is a registered marriage celebrant and he conducted David and Ro's very informal yet heartfelt and loving ceremony. John is a gentle giant of a man and had a way of expressing a lot with just a few well chosen words.
Husband and wife now!!
Windswept but carried away in a tide of love - all 35 of us were there to witness all this happiness.
We didn't have to walk far to the party afterwards - at the local Bilinga Beach Surf Lifesaving Club.
David and Ro led the dancing after dinner with their astoundingly good, and sexy, interpretation (choreographed) of Leonard Cohen's "I'm Your Man". You can imagine the cheers and whistles this act brought on.
We all danced for hours afterwards to a great playlist of familiar old bangers and more current songs for the younger guests. I danced so hard I felt very overworked when I woke up the next morning.
A recovery bar-b-que for around 50 people was planned for the day after, but once again the stormy weather intervened and plans had to be changed. David and Ro had around 10 of the units booked in our Pacific Surf resort at Tugun, quite a few of them adjoining each other on the same floor. A drinks station was set up in the wide common corridor - food was set out in two of the units and guests wandered in and out throughout the afternoon. It all worked out so well.
My job was to decorate the cake. Ro had made 3 layers of fruit cake to cater to all the various dietary needs and my icing had to be similarly dietary aware too. A lot of Valentine's Day flowers were used in the creation of this wedding cake extravaganza!
Ro did the honours and we all toasted the health and future happiness of this amazing pair. 
It was a wonderful wedding celebration - just perfect for this pair of adventurers, very much grounded in love and family and absolute certainty about facing whatever life throws at them together in the years ahead. We felt so lucky to be able to share this time with them.
We went for a long beach walk on our first morning after we arrived with David and Ro and David's sister and partner.
The coastal path on the other hand extends all the way from Currumbin to Kirra and it gets a lot of use too (including from us on this visit).
We walked to Currumbin Creek a few times along the beach. Its a great learn to surf spot for the young ones in the protected surf break leading into the creek inlet.
We had a couple of swims off the beach outside our unit. The water temperature was perfect as far as I was concerned (27oC!) but the seas got rougher as the more unstable weather blew in.
We enjoyed our stay in Tugun so much, even aside from all the wedding celebrations and excitement, that we have booked another 5 night stay later in the year (end of April!)
