Unless you are fortunate enough to have all your friends and family live in the same town as you, chances are you are going to have people that will be traveling in order to attend your wedding. While anyone who travels to a wedding (or anywhere) assumes that there will be some sort of time and financial burden, I always think that it's nice when the bride and groom do their best to ease the burdens of their travelers. Here are just a few things you can do to help make the trip a more enjoyable one for your guests.
Provide them with information about local resources.
Planning a trip can be a lot of work, so help out your guests by providing them with some of the basic information they'll need. If you know you have guests that are going to be flying, include information about nearby airports and car rental services. Give them information about lodging options and, if possible, reserve a block of rooms at a local hotel or two (some guests may still opt to shop around to see if they can find a better rate, but by reserving some rooms you guarantee that there are some rooms available for your wedding guests just in case there are other events in the area that may cause the hotels to fill up). Also, try to make a map available to your guests that has the main locations (ceremony, reception, etc) well-marked, or at least provide them with the exact addresses of those locations so they can map them themselves. Much of this information can be included with the wedding invitation, although many couples also choose to create a wedding website and have this information available on there as well.
Try to minimize the amount of down time for your guests.
In my opinion, there is nothing worse than being in an unfamiliar town with nothing to do for three hours between the ceremony and reception. If possible, try to keep your events close together so that guests aren't left to wander aimlessly. However, I also understand that sometimes special circumstances dictate the schedule of your day, and downtime is unavoidable. If you know there is going to be downtime, try to provide your guests with some options, especially if they are unfamiliar with the area: local points of interests, nearby parks, perhaps even a favorite bar or two. Even if they don't take advantage of your suggestions and opt to just hang out in their hotel room, they'll appreciate that you took the time to give them some guidance.
Have a welcome bag for them when they check into the hotel.
This requires a little bit of coordination with the hotels that your have rooms reserved at, but your guests will definitely appreciate the effort. Darrell and I did this for our wedding, and all we had to do was tell the front desk that whenever anyone checked in who had made a reservation in our block of rooms that they should be given a small goodie bag in addition to their room key. Not only are these welcome bags a good way to provide your guests with information about local things to do as well as detailed maps of the area, but you can also slip in a few goodies for the weary travelers: a bottle of water, trail mix, chocolate, etc. It can also be helpful to provide them with a person's contact information in case they have any difficulty navigating to wedding events; you may be difficult to get a hold of on your big day (and guests might feel bad calling you anyway), so provide them with the number of a trusted friend or family member who can help direct people who get lost.
Most guests will consider it an honor and a privilege to celebrate your wedding with you, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't acknowledge the sacrifices they made to be in attendance. Do what you can to make sure they know their presence is appreciated--because trust me, the whole wedding day will go by so fast that you may not get the personal time with all your guests that you would like.
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