THE wedding plans of a Little Sutton couple appeared to have gone up in smoke when a huge blaze ripped through Ellesmere Port's Holiday Inn.

But just as Kathy Lloyd and Neil Ebbrell were about to postpone their big day, hotel bosses came to the rescue and found an alternative venue.

Kathy, 35, says she was devastated after the Holiday Inn's roof was destroyed, leaving hotel chiefs no choice but to cancel all their arrangements with just seven days to go.

She said: 'I couldn't stop crying. We had 270 guests coming and we couldn't find a new venue at such short notice. We were just about to postpone everything until the New Year when the Hoilday Inn arranged for everything to be switched across to Chester Racecource's banqueting suite.

'On Saturday everything went without a hitch and we had a brilliant day. The Holiday Inn people even arranged for a Rolls-Royce to take me to the ceremony and presented us with a bottle of champagne and two crystal glasses engraved with our names.'

She added: 'As if that wasn't enough they also picked up the bill for us to stay at the Queen's Hotel in Chester before we flew out to Barcelona for our honeymoon.'