Frequently Asked Questions About Rain

Let me start off by saying that I love rain on the wedding day.  The lighting is beautiful and easy to work with.  The fog lifts up out of the gorge and creates beautiful pockets of white fluffiness.  When the sun dips below the line of clouds at sunset the palate of colors it creates is an amazing display that a clear sunny day cannot compete with.  With that being said, you are probably still a little worried about rain…this is perfectly normal!  Here are some answers to the most frequently asked questions about the weather.

I checked the ten day forecast and there is a 55% chance of rain and now I’m freaking out.  Should we go ahead and plan on having the ceremony  at Three Feathers Farm ?  No.  First off, you are going to drive yourself batty if you spend the last month before your wedding checking the forecast.  The Red River Gorge is in a sunken area southeastern Kentucky.  The accuracy of the weather reports for this area ten days out are correct about 2% of the time.  Why?  We have found by looking at the radar that storms have a tendency to split to the north and south at the last minute and go around the RRG (which is a much lower elevation than it’s surroundings).  There have been many an evening when Dave and I are sitting in our cabin listening to NPR radio and there are severe thunder storm warnings all through the area and there is not a cloud in the sky where we are.  Long story short…because of our low elevation and the higher elevation surrounding us, weather reports aren’t really much help until the last few hours before your ceremony.

When should I start checking the weather?  I usually suggest to start checking the day before.  We will make no calls until the day of, however.  We have had too many brides freak out and change everything to the Gallery and then have the sun bright and shining during their indoor ceremony.  You have paid a lot of money to have an outdoor wedding at a beautiful location…let’s see what we can do to make that happen.

What is the rain backup plan?  We have a few options:
– Continue on.  If it is a light drizzle, overcast with a threat of rain or spotty rain, we move forward as planned.  Have your guest hunker down and bring their umbrellas.  If you want to use an umbrella during your ceremony, you can certainly do that but we don’t suggest it (depending on the angle, the photos might be of two umbrellas getting married as we might not be able to get in there and get shots around the umbrellas).
– We wait it out.  Usually storms in the area are spotty and we can time it so that we can have the ceremony between them.
–Change your location to a shorter walk.  You do have the option to make the call to have your ceremony at a location with a shorter walk at this time.  We suggest Location A ,D or E.
–Change your location to one of our covered locations (if you have chosen our one hour package and still want to hike).  Some of our ceremony sites have alternate options along the trail that shelter you from the rain.  Location H, I, J, P and O all have these options.  Your guest will need to bring umbrellas and non-dressy walking shoes as the paths to these locations might be muddy depending on the amount of rain.
–Have your ceremony at your cabin.  If your cabin company allows it, you can always move your ceremony to your cabin if our schedule permits.  This might be an option if we do not have a ceremony before or after yours within the gorge.  This works best if you are eloping with no or only have a few guest.
–Change your ceremony to the next day.  If none of the options above are feasible and our schedule permits and you are staying in the gorge for a few days, we could switch your ceremony to the next day.
–Use Three Feather Farm Barn. We do have the option to just do it there Monday- Thursday for sure and possibly Friday-Sun if they do not have events.