Sophie

I guess it's a little late to be posting this, as my wedding is just one month away (). Username: Sophie Names: Sergio and Melanie Date & Time: April 6, 2010, 6pm Wedding package: Ultimate Wedding extras (through the resort): Three flower arrangements for the ceremony gazebo, flowers for the walkway, sound system for the ceremony and the reception, hot pink bows on the chairs at the ceremony and reception, aqua tablecloths, tiki torches Outside vendors (cost charged by vendor and any fees charged by the resort): None Type of ceremony: Legal Coordinator: Aurora Number of guests: 15-20 Ceremony location and time: Beach at 6 Cocktail hour location and time: Beach from 6:30 - 7:30 Reception location and time: Beach from 7:30 - 10:30 Photographer: Resort Videographer: Resort Review (link): N/a Photos (link): N/a Video (link): N/a Planning thread (link): N/a Wedding website (link): Sergio and Melanie's Wedding Special arrangements / activities: Group trip to Chichen Itza

Aurora emailed me back yesterday saying that arriving on March 31st or April 1st will both be early enough for a legal ceremony on April 6th, even with the holidays! Problem solved!

Quote: Originally Posted by jerzygirl85 Welcome and congratulations!! I am getting married on April 24th! The week you arrive is holy week which is a big holiday in Mexico. I know that many offices are closed during that time. I just looked at the 2010 guide and it does mention that holidays don't count. Are you planning on having a legal ceremony or a symbolic one? If it's symbolic then you don't need to worry about it. Congratulations to you too, and thanks for the welcome! We're having a legal ceremony, which is why we're a bit worried about the dates. I guess for now we'll hold off on buying our flights, so we can figure this all out.

I'm getting married at Dreams Tulum on April 6, 2010 (yay! ), and we were about to make our reservations today when I realized something. Our wedding is on a Tuesday, so we were going to fly in the previous Wednesday and have Thursday, Friday, and Monday count as our 3 business days prior to the wedding. However, Thursday, April 1st, is Maundy Thursday, and Friday, April 2nd, is Good Friday. I emailed Aurora a few minutes ago, but I wanted to see if anyone here might know. Will these days still count towards our 3 days, or do we have to get to Cancun even earlier (and miss even more work/school)? Help! (oh, and hi! I've been reading this thread fairly regularly, but I think it's my first post in it, so it's nice to meet you all.)

My fiance and I are planning to get married in Riviera Maya, and will have about 4 weeks off for our honeymoon. We both love to travel, and were thinking since we're already going to be so far south, why not just continue to head south into Central and South America. Have any of you done this? We'll probably have around $10,000 for the HM, and we're open to other suggestions. Pretty much anywhere in the world (that we can afford) is open, but we don't want to stay in one place for a long time. We're also fine with traveling on the cheap (local buses, lower-end hotels, etc). I'm kind of overwhelmed with all of the possibilities right now, so I'd love to get some suggestions or ideas.

Okay, this is the last time I change my mind, I swear! My fiance and I decided to postpone the wedding for 2 years. He didn't like the idea of having it in the summer, and my mom wasn't real pleased with it either. I looked into PV and Cabo, but both were still really expensive around New Year's, and I've fallen in love with RM. Luckily we had only told our closest family so far, so it won't be hard to let them know about the change. I think they'll be relieved too, because they're a lot less naive than I am, and were already really worried about the holiday prices. In 3 years I'll be in my fourth year of med school, and we get to schedule our own rotations then. A lot of people schedule 4 or more weeks of rotation as pure vacation time, so that way we won't have to work around the summer vacation/winter vacation school schedule. It'll be a nice almost-done-with-school celebration, too. I still want to hang around here and get lots of ideas, though. Everyone's so nice, and there's so much good information. With 3 years to plan, my wedding's got to turn out great right? Thank you all for being so helpful!

Hi Dee! Thanks for the reply. Good luck with all of your planning. Are you having guests? If so, have they commented on it being difficult to plan a vacation on short notice?

Oh, and to make this comparison a little more tangible, here are some samples of prices I've been able to find: 7/26/07 to 8/3/07 Hotel for 8 nights + Flight from LAX Barcelo Maya Beach Resort (AI) $1,048 per person Barcelo Tucancun Beach (AI) $927 pp Grand Palladium Colonial Resort & Spa (AI) $1,221 pp Avalon Grand Cancun (AI) $975 12/26/07 to 1/3/08 Hotel for 8 nights + Flight from LAX Hacienda Vista Real Resort & Spa (AI) $2,781 pp (I realize this might be a more expensive hotel than the ones I listed for the 7/26 to 8/3 dates, but this was the only AI that was available for 12/26 to 1/3 on BookIt. com) 12/26/07 to 1/3/08 for Hotel only (from Hotels.com) Barcelo Maya Beach Resort (AI) $595 per night Barcelo Tucancun (AI) $412 per night A lot of hotels don't have 12/26 to 1/3 available, so it makes comparing harder. But it's obvious things are way cheaper in July/August, and that there are many more options.

By the way, thanks to everyone for the advice and information. I posted another thread to get info on summer weddings in RM, but please don't think I'm jumping ship on January. January is still my preferred choice of dates, but I figure it's best to consider other options, too.

I've been getting really discouraged trying to plan for a wedding on January 1, 2008. Most of the hotels are 2 to 3 times what they would normally be, because of the holidays, and this makes them all too expensive for our guests. It seems like my options are either to not have the wedding I really want, figure out how to take out a huge loan to cover the additional costs, or change my date. The more research I do, the more I love the idea of our guests, my fiance, and me to all be able to stay in the same all-inclusive resort. We have always done the budget traveling, staying at the cheapest hotels, eating at the cheapest restaurants, and I really want my family to be able to experience being pampered for once. If we keep our current wedding date, they'll have to go the budget route again, and this breaks my heart. We need to plan our wedding around school schedules, since my fiance and I are both students, my 3 little siblings are all in school, and most of our friends are still in school. Christmas vacation seemed ideal. The only other option is to have it over summer vacation. The main pro I can see for summer vacation (specifically late July, early August) is that everything is SO much cheaper. I just did a few quick price checks, and my family would be able to afford staying at an all-inclusive if we had it over the summer. However, I'm worried about the temperature, hurricanes, and rain. Also, that's only 4.5 months away, so it might be harder for people to get days off work and to plan their vacations. I don't get a summer vacation next year or the year after (my school goes all year after 1st year), so the options are pretty much just this summer, or Christmas vacation. Sorry this ended up so long. I'm kind of depressed right now, and would really appreciate advice on what to do.

Julie: Thank you so much for the information on the Blue Parrot! Their prices look really reasonable. I got the first two documents, but I didn't have enough for the 3rd - I think I will once I make this post, though, so I'll check it out then. It seems like they can arrange everything for you - do you think I'd still need to get a WC even if I booked everything through Blue Parrot? Melissa: Thanks for the day pass price. Unfortunately I checked out Barcelo Maya's room rates right after I posted last time, and the cheapest I can find is $595 per night. Stupid holidays. This definitely puts it out of our guests' price ranges, and ours too, since that means we'd have to pay $77 for each guest, plus the $25 per additional guest over 20 (for the wedding package). Bride2b: Thanks for the tip. Hotel Lunata's website looks really nice - I'll be sure to check it out further.

Thank you both for the helpful responses! Melissa: The Barcelo Maya was on my list of resorts I like, with fairly decent prices, so now I'll definitely look into it more seriously. Do you happen to know how much their day passes are? Unfortunately Paraiso Azul emailed me back and said they can't rent their whole hotel out to one group over the holidays, and could give me at most 4 of their rooms. I was very impressed that they got back to me so quickly (I emailed them at midnight, and they responded within 4 hours!), and the response was very polite. I'd love to hear what you think of it when you check it out. Jennette: The Al Cielo Hotel looks incredible. I loved all of their pictures, and it really does look like the perfect setting for a wedding. Unfortunately their least expensive civil package is already out of my price range. Otherwise that would be a wonderful place to get married.

The more research I've done, the more I realize how insanely expensive having a wedding at the time of year we chose (unfortunately based on necessity, so no changing the date) is going to be. I found what looks like a great little hotel in Playa del Carmen (if anyone is interested, it is called Paraiso Azul's) that is very reasonable, and I kind of like the idea of "taking over" a small hotel solely with our guests. However, I'm wondering if that eliminates the possibility of having our ceremony at one of the nearby resorts. If my fiance and I were to stay at a resort just on the night before our wedding, would we be eligible to have our ceremony there? Are there any resorts that don't make guests not staying at the hotel buy a day pass in order to attend the ceremony, or any that have day passes for a moderate price? Also, if guests buy a day pass, are they then able to eat in the resort's restaurants, use the pool, and take part in the resort's activities? I'm considering the possibility of having our reception in a restaurant (we will probably have around 30 to 40 guests), since that seems like it might be cheaper. I'm also totally open to having my ceremony somewhere other than a resort, if I could figure out how to safely, and relatively worry-free, plan this without having to hire a wedding planner (which we really can't afford). If anyone has any ideas I'm all ears. Thank you!

Oh wow.. I was hoping to stay under $5,000, but it seems like that's not a possibility after looking at everyone else's budgets. We're both students living off of student loans, so saving up isn't an option, and we'd rather not make our parents pay for much. We're expecting around 30 guests, and would be more than happy with a simple (but still special) wedding. Here's my rough budget so far: Dress and accessories - $300 Tux/Suit - $200 Videography - $0 (recruiting a friend in film school) Music - $200 (just for ceremony; hopefully bringing ipod and own speakers for reception) Invitations - $80 (doing them ourselves) Save the Date cards - $50 (ourselves) Rings - ? Photographer - $0 (recruiting a friend in art school) Ceremony + Reception - $2,000 (hopefully free basic package + add-ons for additional guests) Total so far: $2,830 I'm considering my fiance and my travel expenses as separate from the cost of the wedding (because the wedding budget looks much more tolerable that way) We're hoping the cost of our flights plus the hotel room will total less than $3,000.

Thank you for all of the replies. =) I have been reading through a lot of the threads, and they are WONDERFUL! There's so much information here. I will definitely share any information/tips I get over the coming months as well. Oh, and Sarah, your dog is adorable