Hi- hoping to get some information about the Prague airport for self transfers as an american traveler/some layover advice :)

I have a nonstop flight booked from NY to Prague landing on a Tuesday morning at 9 AM into terminal 1.

Plans have changed a bit and I need to get down to Vienna the day that I land in Prague, and I am considering buying a plane ticket from Prague to Vienna. This would mean I would need to self transfer, which I’ve never done before.

I’ll be landing in terminal 1 as an American and would need to get to terminal 2 for the flight from Prague to Vienna. Is 2 hr and 15 min cutting it too close for a layover considering that Prague is my first entrance into the Schengen Area? I’ve never flown into Prague before and I know that things are a little bit more complicated now with the EES.

I’ll only have a carry on which should help me timing wise but unsure if that’s cutting it too close with getting through customs (and possibly needing to go back through security?)

I have been googling it but figured I would see if anyone here has experience with this. Thank you :)

My destination brides!!

I just graduated and had the most incredible wedding in Lisbon! After spending months tediously researching venues and vendors, I wanted to share who we landed on for any brides planning a wedding in Portugal.

This is a LONG post that I am writing because I wish had had it when we began planning.

Please note that these are my opinions, preferences and views. Please don’t come at me!

Context/background:

We live in New York, but my (now!!) husband is Portuguese and his entire family lives in Portugal. We wanted to have a wedding that felt authentic and Portuguese, but also felt familiar to the weddings we have/are used to having in New York. I also speak very limited Portuguese so I wanted to be able to communicate and plan effectively from abroad in English.

So. With that and mind and after attending a ton of local and destination weddings, below were our big 4 criteria:

1.) venue within 30 minutes of central Lisbon for guest convenience
Why? half of the wedding has already traveled from New York and we didn’t want to put them on a bus for an hour plus to get to our wedding and then have another hour plus to get back at 2 AM. Also, if someone wasn’t feeling well, they would be able to quickly Uber/Lyft/Bolt back to their hotel.

2.) venue needed to have a beautiful indoor space for the ceremony and reception
Wh? so many venues in Portugal are dependent on it being nice out in order to fully experience and appreciate the space, so the inside look and feel mattered a lot to us. I didn’t want to add being stressed about weather to the long list of stressors that come with having a destination wedding

3.) catering and chairs/tables/linens needed to be included with the venue and/or available onsite to rent from the venue itself
Why? Too big of a logistical nightmare, costs add up/sneakup…just too stressful for me personally.

4.) the dance floor needed to be in the same room as dinner and have AIR CONDITIONING
Why? this may sound like a funny detail, but we wanted everyone to feel included and apart of the celebration even if they didn’t feel like dancing instead of being isolated in a separate dining area or standing and watching from the sidelines. Also I hate getting hot so AC was a must

So after an INSANE amount of research, we found our venue:

Wedding Venue:

Quinta dos Gafanhotos (about 20 min outside Lisbon)

https://www.instagram.com/quintagafanhotos/

This was found after scouring google maps and the casamentos.pt website. No notes. Seriously it was amazing. People don’t seem to know about it and I need to bring awareness to it. The food and service was fantastic and the venue is GORGEOUS. The website and instagram legit doesn’t do it justice. The indoor ceremony space made me cry when we went to tour venues (and this was after already having seen forte da Cruz and vandelli botanical garden, which were our 2 main contenders. We also saw countless others. It was very authentic and very special and we knew it was where we would get married as soon as we visited.

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Wedding Planner + Coordinator:

byMatilda

https://www.instagram.com/bymatilda.pt/

We went into wedding planning thinking that we could do it all on our own and that we would just need a day of coordinator, so we ended up picking our venue and all of our vendors (other than our dj) before reaching out to wedding planner/coordinators, and we actually found byMatilda through another Reddit post. Despite us having all of the vendors selected, we still ended up hiring them for their full wedding planning and coordinating services. it was well, well worth it and I seriously don’t think we could’ve pulled it off without them. they think of so many different logistical/timeline items that no matter how type A you are you just probably wouldn’t think of. They also have been to so many weddings that they can really help your organize a day of timeline that makes sense/isn’t stressful and are able to pick out little things that you should do to make the day run smoothly. They also did the behind the scenes decor plan and made the space beautiful without spending a million dollars on florals. Sara and Filipa were incredible. I have nothing but positive things to say about them!

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Bridal Hair + Makeup

Mariya Sazonov

https://www.instagram.com/mariyasazonov_/

Mariya did an amazing job with my bridal hair and makeup, and then also did an amazing job with my mother and mother-in-law’s makeup (she’s great with mature skin). I found her on instagram and I hired her before doing a hair and makeup trial…which was risky and scary! I did my hair and makeup trial 2 days before the wedding and i literally have never looked better hahah she is SO so talented. She came with 2 assistants to do my sisters and nieces hair and makeup and they were both incredible. 10/10.

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Photo + Videographer

Wed Stories Portugal (photo): https://www.instagram.com/wedstoriesportugal/

Sugu stories (video): https://www.instagram.com/sugu.stories

Stephanie sales did our engagement photos when we got engaged last year and we loved her so much that we hired her for the wedding!

Ricardo sugu came highly recommended from her as a videographer and we went with him (Sugu Stories)

Stephanie and Ricardo then joined forces and created the joint wedding photo and videography company (Wed stories Portugal), but this happened after we hired them both separately.

You can hire them independent of each other, but they work so well together and did such a great job. I would highly recommend using them as a team!

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Wedding celebrant:

Joana Raio

https://www.instagram.com/celebrant_joanaraio/

A lot of our wedding guests speak limited English and a lot of our wedding guests speak zero Portuguese. We needed a bilingual ceremony and weren’t sure how to do it, and we found Joana through gigheaven. She has such a beautiful and warm voice and her cadence was great. Perfect English and Portuguese translations. She made the ceremony super personalized and also wrote it in a way that made everyone laugh. She was awesome!

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Guest Transportation between Lisbon hotels and venue

Weekend Treasure

https://www.instagram.com/weekendtreasure/

Reliable transportation that our friends who previously got married in Lisbon used. The shuttles were air-conditioned and super clean and they were really reliable. They made sure everybody got from both hotels that our guests were staying at to the venue and then also did a final count at the end of the night to make sure that they left nobody behind.

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Wedding dj

D’Johnz:

https://www.instagram.com/thedjohnz/

The Dj was the hardest vendor to find and we actually relied on our wedding coordinator/planner to help us and they recommended him and he was literally amazing! He was so so fun and everyone was dancing all night. I also had an extensive “do not play list” and he followed it perfectly. I spoke to him once before the wedding for maybe five minutes, and he literally was able to sense the vibe of me and my husband alongside everybody at the venue and switch up what he was playing to accommodate both the Americans and the Portuguese without anyone getting bored. Amazing.

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Photo Booth

Memory Box

https://www.instagram.com/memoryboxpt/

This was such a good addition at our wedding. It’s super common in New York to have a Photo Booth at weddings (unsure how common it is elsewhere) but definitely look into using them because they were so fun and such a hit! They are based in Algarve but they travelled up to Lisbon.

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Cocktail Hour Band

Bossa e Morna (Bossa Nova band)

https://www.instagram.com/bossaemorna/

THEY WERE SO FUN AND SO COOL the guests were obsessed with them. They also covered a lot of American hits alongside bossa nova hits and it was lit

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Ceremony Music

String Quartet Solutions

(we did a cello + violin duo and it was beautiful)

https://www.instagram.com/stringquartetsolutions/

This was a beautiful additional touch that we added on pretty last minute within the few weeks leading into the wedding. They played music for the entrances and the exits.

Going to be in Prague for 8-9 days and want to do a 2-3 day trip midway through to another city.

It will be 2 American females mid-30s, one of which will be 5~ months pregnant, traveling to Prague for the first time and have never been anywhere in Central/eastern Europe before.

We were thinking Budapest but now we are wondering if it is the best/optimal choice because 1) we would need to avoid thermal baths due to pregnancy 2) we wouldn’t be going to bars/clubs 3) it could end up being a lot walking wise

Does Budapest still make sense and I am overthinking it? does Vienna or Salzburg or somewhere else make more sense? Just want to do right by my pregnant friend and by the cities :)

We are not HUGE on museums but would likely go to a few. We like to walk around, take in sights, drink coffee, explore gardens, admire architecture and sights, eat good food, see live music/concerts, and just enjoy outdoors. Not big into shopping.

Any tips/advice? Also open to other city recs or if we should just do a ton of day trips to towns and sights outside Prague instead… we are also open to that :)