Baie Lazare is a wide, calm bay on the south-west coast of Mahe, a quieter and genuinely beautiful part of the island near Petite Anse, where the Four Seasons sits. It is a favourite of ours, a soft golden beach that photographs wonderfully in the late afternoon and suits everything from a two-person elopement to a resort wedding nearby. We have filmed more than one wedding here, and one is on this page.
Watch the real wedding film we shot here
The setting
Baie Lazare gives you the calmer, more local side of Mahe, a broad sheltered bay, soft sand, and hills that catch the last of the sun. It is away from the busier north of the island, so a beach ceremony here feels unhurried and private, and the light in the golden hour is some of the loveliest on Mahe. The area also puts you close to the fine resorts of the south-west if you want to stay in luxury nearby.
Marrying here
A wedding at Baie Lazare is a legal Seychelles ceremony, the registrar comes to the beach and marries you there, and we handle or guide the paperwork so it is valid at home. Because it is a public beach we time your ceremony for privacy and the best light, and we keep a sheltered fallback for weather. It suits an intimate elopement particularly well, and we provide the legal witnesses if it is just the two of you.
How we work here
We know this bay, how it empties toward the end of the day and how the sun sits on the water, which is exactly why we return to it. Whether you are marrying on the beach itself or at a resort nearby, we shoot it the way we know works here. Watch a real Baie Lazare wedding on this page, then tell us your date and we will plan the day around the bay's golden hour.
The beach here, and when it is at its best
Seychelles has two seasons blowing from opposite directions, and that is what decides whether a beach is calm or blown on your date. From roughly May to September the south east trades run dry and steady, pushing chop and drifting seaweed onto anything facing south or south east. From roughly November to March the north west monsoon takes over, wetter and lighter on wind, and the exposure flips. April and October are the changeovers, when it goes quiet on every coast.
Baie Lazare faces west, which puts it at its calmest from May to September. The bay itself is west facing and sheltered from the trades, though the more southerly beaches a few minutes away take the swell in those same months, which is exactly the kind of difference worth getting right.
We will still confirm the exact spot and the exact hour for your date before you commit to it, because the sea has moods and a beach is not one single place.
The paperwork, and what the government charges here
The legal side is lighter than most couples expect. As two foreign nationals you need a valid passport and an apostilled birth certificate each, plus a divorce certificate if either of you has been married before or a death certificate if widowed. The banns are published for eleven days before the ceremony. Two witnesses must be present, and if you are marrying as just the two of you we provide them.
The government marriage fee here is SCR 3,000. That is the Civil Status Office rate for two foreigners marrying on Mahe, Praslin or La Digue.
One detail that catches people out. The Civil Status Office expects to register the marriage at its own office, so if the registration is to happen anywhere else, which is exactly what a ceremony at the resort means, it asks to be told at least a week beforehand. That is our job, not yours, but it is worth knowing the week exists.