Cambodia ranks as Romantic Destination for the year 2007

If you?re planning a romantic getaway to celebrate your new marriage, we want you to know you?ve got the Babylonians to thank for making honeymoons part of our wedding vocabulary. According to lore, it was a tradition for newlyweds to go into hiding for a full lunar cycle and drink nothing but mead.

Part of this custom, as we understand it, was to make the bride?s family forget about her existence so that she couldn?t just wander back home and continue living with them. Given the alcoholic content of this honey-based libation, it can probably also be assumed neither of them even remembered her address after a month of drinking, much less their own names.

Through the subsequent centuries, the ?away time? for couples came to symbolize an opportunity for them to escape their workaday worries and focus on getting acquainted. During the Victorian and Edwardian eras, this translated to anywhere from three months to a year and a half and involved plentiful hat boxes, steamer trunks and grand tours to exotic vistas where total strangers could toast their happiness.

Though few but the very rich these days can afford to disappear off the planet for long stretches, the speed of transportation and the global microscope created by the Internet has allowed couples to not only lock down a host of exciting venues in which to exchange their wedding vows but also book exotic retreats that bear absolutely no resemblance to the cities and suburbs to which they will ? all too soon ? return and settle into domestic bliss.

Among the hottest wedding venues for 2007 are vintage theaters, beaches, rustic barns, hotel ballrooms, botanical gardens, toney estates and plantations (especially in the South), bed and breakfast inns, and Medieval castles. The good news? Your guests will be nothing less than awestruck. The bad news? The more people who have already discovered your dream site, the farther in advance you?ll need to lock down a reservation. If the site is somewhat inaccessible (i.e., the middle of the Mojave), you?ll also need to take into thoughtful consideration how, exactly, your elderly Aunt Liz is supposed to get there.

Honeymoon havens have likewise moved beyond an earlier generation?s satisfaction with Niagara Falls, Waikiki and Tijuana. For the adventurous, such ports of call as Belize, Brazil, the Galapagos Islands, Cambodia, Costa Rica and the Seychelles are on brides and grooms? 2007 wish list. Want to emulate the ?grand tour? magic of the early 20th century? Cruise ships across the Mediterranean and land excursions that explore Borneo, Sri Lanka, Cape Town and India are reported to be in vogue by today?s travel agents.

On the other hand, maybe you lovebirds just want some R&R and lots of pampering. Hot ticket spots this year include Costa de la Luz in Spain, farm-stays in Central Italy, secluded pueblos in Andalusia and an ecolodge in the Yucatan.

Not a morning person? The Transylvanian lodges at the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains are a popular attraction we?re told you can really sink your teeth into.