IT was the worst possible Christmas for Natalie Welton and Dell Harvey when they learned their dream wedding plans had been thrown into disarray by the closure of a hotel.

The couple, who live in Carnation Terrace, Bradwell, received the bombshell news the week before Christmas that the venue for their wedding reception, Broad House Hotel, Wroxham, had gone into administration and they were likely to lose nearly all of their �2,000 deposit.

Worse still, the closure of the hotel, which also affected other wedding plans, left the couple less than a month to find an alternative venue ahead of their big day last Friday.

However, the amazing response of a new reception venue, Coronation Barn, Southwood Hall, Freethorpe, saved the day for Natalie, 24, and offshore worker Dell, 25, who are now happily on honeymoon in Mexico.

Natalie’s father Graham, 54, manager of the Co-op in Magdalen Way, Gorleston, praised the “brilliant” attitude of staff at Southwood Hall who worked round the clock to get the barn ready for opening a week earlier than had been intended. He said: “They worked through Thursday night to get the honeymoon suite prepared and the outside cement was still wet on the day.”

Mr Welton, who paid the original deposit, said it had been a disaster in the making when the reception for 70 guests was cancelled as the wedding at St Andrew’s Church, Gorleston, and the honeymoon were already booked.

He said: “After a number of telephone calls and trips round the county by my mother and father- in-law, Peter and Jane, we found Southwood Hall.”

Natalie, an office worker at Claxton Engineering, Yarmouth, had then visited the venue and fallen in love with it, but unfortunately the barn conversion was unfinished and the first wedding reception was not planned until January 30.

Mr Welton said: “Natalie’s desperate pleading must have helped and they obviously felt sorry for her because the management agreed to speed up the final work.”

He said they had subsequently learned that Broad House Hotel was likely to be reopening and the new managers would honour their booking, but it would have been too late for their wedding.