CarrieRN

Quote: Originally Posted by calchik yup as far as i know which is why it's my ruins of choice well you girls have changed my mind. not doing the coba trip the day before the wedding and skipping the akumal beach/ bay part as well. pretty sure we collectivo to akumal if we wanted on some other day anyways. the cancunvista guy said it's only 15 mins from our resort this will be much easier for my group excursion. but now the tour guy is gone until april 1 so i won't get my quote until then. i've already told him i want just transportation and no tour guide at all. just over 5 weeks til i leave. woot! the waiting is almost over Akumal Beach is beautiful. I definitely recommend going there. Is super close to resort and an easy half day trip. We went in the morning, had a beer at the beach bar, looked in the shops and then headed back. We didn't stay at the beach because none of us wanted to drag along a change of clothes. Besides, our wristbands couldn't get us free drinks in Akumal! : )

We had our reception at the Mediterranan restaurant. We were the only ones there for most of it and occupied half the restaurant. It worked out perfectly. At Coba, there was a quiet pool, the activities pool and two jacuzzi pools. All with bars. We didnt have anyone complain about taking the trolley to the beach.

Quote: Originally Posted by Erica_Bellerive So if you stay at the Coba you can use the Gaxebo?? Thanks for the info everyone. I have to talk to my cousin who is also getting married that week to make a decision. We were offered the use of the gazebo and we stayed at Coba. We chose the palapas next to the gazebo. You can see the beach in a lot of our pictures. And then we went straight down to the beach to get photos taken. I think it depends on how many weddings there are that day and who booked first.

We used Michael Maurus as our photographer. I think his website is cancun-weddingphotographer.com. Here is a link to our wedding photos. Most of them were taken by Michael. (A few were taken by my brother in law with his really fancy camera.) Picasa Web Albums - Carrie - Carrie&David'... Michael's prices were great and he was prompt with emails and information as well as punctual on the wedding day.

Quote: Originally Posted by JoLo908 Okay, I am really excited... As a birthday/ graduation present, my FI booked us a trip to go check out the resort in early March (yippee!) He booked the Coba section since we will be in the Tulum for our wedding, he wanted to try a something a little different but still get to check out the resort (I am still in schock... major shock)... What is the best a la cart restaurant in Coba? And if anyone wants ANY info, let me know! I am going to try to book a meeting with Jazmin to see if we can look at flowers/ things like that... anyway, let me know! So excited, he told me tonight!!!!! That's so exciting! I would definitely eat at the japanese restaurant, Mikado. Le Gourmet was good as well. I pretty much ordered steak at all of the ala cartes and it was good everywhere!

You and your FI will be upgraded. The computers at Coba were in the premier lobby. If you don't have the gold bracelet, they charge you to use the computers. Depending on how many people are using the computers, they do enforce the rule. We did give out the password to friends and some were able to sneak on. There is also wireless in the Coba premier lobby that we only found out because someone tried. Apparently the computers are all connected using an unsecured wireless network. There is no computer access in the rooms. We never bothered looking into the computers at the hacienda.

We stayed at Coba. We chose the beach location that is right next to the gazebo. It is the same as the ones pictured above. There are 2 beach locations that I am aware of. One is the one to the right of the gazebo (and you can see the palapas (the thached roof things) in the picture of the gazebo) and the other is down on the beach in front of Akumal. Both are pretty but the location near the gazebo is much more private. Availability depends on whether the gazebo is being used that day and at what time. It didn't seem like it mattered which resort you are staying at when choosing wedding sites. The WC has a big binder and you choose site, flowers and cake/music options when you get to the resort.

Quote: Originally Posted by JoLo908 We are having a huge number of people... (about 50 people are booked so far, and we are thinking maybe 60 or 65 will be there.) We are having the religious ceremony which is $1160, and are having the private mixed grill poolside reception which, with alcohol comes to $29 a head. So, how is everything all tallyed up on your bill at the end of the trip? I am assuming it all gets thrown on your credit card?(and I am going to call the credit card company the week before to tell them we are getting married down in Mex. so they do not get suspicious of fraud). I tallyed up the cost of what it is going to be to have the ceremony, and the reception, and maybe a few extras (extra flowers or something) and it comes to about $3300. I am just super scared that if they do not give you a breakdown of cost of things, that they will charge us for whatever they want!! I am freaking out... I have to try to save up some money for grad. school and was hoping to have some left over after the wedding... sorry... Any advice And we are having Claudia as our photographer for our wedding and TTD which is costing a pretty penny, but we would regret it if we didnt get good pictures!!! When you meet with the WC and figure things out. She will go over the options you selected and the cost. It is a contract that you sign. Then that goes on your room charges. It was all itemized on our bill for checkout.

We had 46 people total. All we did was choose an appetizer (we went with buffet appetizers), soup and choice of 2 entrees from the menu of the restaurant we chose. We also decided to forgo the dessert choice at the restaurant and just have a bigger wedding cake at no extra charge. It was private for the first hour maybe but still felt fairly private since we took up half the restaurant. It is supposed to count as an ala carte for our guests...but it didn't. They were still able to book all the ala cartes that were included with the Apple package.

The hacienda is the shopping and entertainment area of the gran bahia. It has some shops that are open during the day (and some are still open at night), plus a marketplace set up right where the tram drops you off. Good prices. Plus, there is an internet cafe (not included with AI) and after 1130pm, the discoteca is open. Before the disco opens, they have a band in the courtyard outside. And you can dance there...we did!

That sucks!! I would be so pissed off. All that work and planning you did and they just blow you off? The least the could have done was called and told you they weren't coming.

We didn't have any problems with the restaurants. If you have a larger group trying to make a reservation, they may make you a later time. But it seems like they were willing to accomodate and makes changes. THey may tell you your reservation is at 930p but to check back that day and see if they can change it then. Then they get on their phone and make tons of phone calls and get you in earlier. It seems like they don't really tell you no. They just make it work somehow. I would try to make reservations as soon as you can.

Ooh! So pretty! Glad to hear it is comfy too! You look beautiful!

You dress is beautiful. Looks gorgeous on you.

Everything looks great! Love the notebook for your guests!

Ooh, pretty pictures!

The tequila was good. I had the beef fajita and liked it. They are corn tortillas which is pretty standard for Mexico. Flour tortillas are tex-mex. My flowers had the white plastic holder but I wasn't really particular about it. I picked a bouquet from the book and it was really pretty. I will post more pics soon. Just have to do a save as so I can resize them for here without messing up the pics from the group album.

They are so cute. I just looked and two of them were wrestling and chewing on each other. Then one of them started chewing the tail of a sleeping puppy. The sleeper then proceeded to turn around, curl back up and go back to sleep. That's the dog I like!

We actually got our peeps room numbers from the front desk without any problem. But we were mostly booked as a group so maybe that is why they didn't give us any problems. We did try to get most of them from guests as they checked in. We weren't able to actually leave messages on their phones though. It never went into a voicemail. So, if they are nearby, slip a note under the door or just prearrange a place to meet at some point during the day. We didn't go barefoot for the ceremony but I did for the pictures on the beach afterwards. And then we were off to dinner. It is tricky walking in the sand with heels and also tricky trying not to walk on your dress without heels.

People did that to us at our post wedding dinner. First time, we kissed each other. Second time, we turned the opposite way and kissed our twins (on the cheek). Third time, we kissed other people in our wedding group. People slowed down after that...or maybe it is just because we left the restaurant and went to the lobby bar.

We didn't bring anything for the dj to play. I'm sure if you brought a cd, he would play from it. By the time we got to the disco, we didn't care anymore. I was out dancing with my sister and SIL in the middle of the hacienda with the dancers who worked there. They have music outside the disco until it opens. Also, don't worry about trying to coordinate your group and their activities. It will only stress you out. Just tell people where you plan to be and let them follow you. It was difficult to find everyone since the resort is large and people kept going to different locations. We wound up just picking a place to be and telling people what time to meet us. Then we would pick an evening time to meet in one of the lobbies. Worked out better that way.

Oh, by the way, did I forget to mention that my DH lost his wedding band the day after the ceremony? Oops. He took it off to put sunscreen on and set it on our chairs. Then he came out in the water to meet me. I, of course, noticed right away that he wasn't wearing his ring. When he remembered again, we were already back in one of the jacuzzi pools. It was gone when he went back to the beach. It is a good thing we only spent $30 on the ring and the we bought 2 of them. So, make sure you stress to your FI/DH that the rings are NEVER to be removed. No matter what they are doing. If your honey tends to lose things, take a cheap back-up ring for him to wear during the trip.

Quote: Originally Posted by jkcz0702 Ohh I have one question did you know before you left where your guests would get picked up and what time? I am making welcome books and would like to put that in. We didn't know until the morning of the wedding. When we came back from breakfast, they were in an envelope taped to our door. We just handed them out at the pool when we saw people. Most likely it will be in the lobby of whichever hotel you are staying in.

Hi everyone! We are back and married. I even rode on the van from Cancun with Sarah's parents, but never got to meet Sarah. There are a ton of wedding groups it seems. So, quick review for now, I will work on a more detailed one in a little bit. We just got home last night. The resort (all 3 hotels) is gorgeous and the service was great! We had so much fun on our trip. We had a rocky start since Apple Vacations group department screwed up quite a few reservations in our group, including mine! The resort didn't expect us until the 6th even though we were arriving the 5th. We did get that all ironed out and Iain, the apple rep at Coba was fabulous! So, we didn't get to meet with Alana until the 6th since by the time we arrived, she was already gone for the day. We met with her, picked out flowers and chose our wedding site. We were staying at the Coba (our whole group) and she offered us the wedding gazebo which is over at Tulum. However, we actually didn't want the gazebo and so chose the Palapas which is right next to it on the beach. It was a beautiful location. So, that being done, I set my dress and my sister's dress out on the bed and Alana called and had someone come to pick up the dresses to take them for steaming. She had me write on the form that I needed them for tomorrow. I wrote it in spanish and we had them back just fine for the next day. On wedding day, my sister and I went to get our hair done. It takes forever at that spa so get it done as early as you can. And it is true about the flat iron. My sister's hairgirl did use a curling iron and her curls stayed in much better. My strands that were down and curled lasted 5 minutes tops and then just got on my nerves. I recommend no strands down...mostly based on the pictures in the wind. I did like the rest of my hair style though. So, either bring a curling iron or ask them specifically to use it, they have one. My sister, dad and I were picked up by a special golf car (club-car at the resort) that was decorated with tulle. The rest of the group was picked up at the Coba lobby. Your WC will give you schedules to hand out that details the times and locations for the wedding and dinner. Our only mix up was that people got worried when the cart didn't arrive exactly on time (which is the norm in Mexico) and went in to make sure they were at the correct lobby (we checked in at the premier lobby because we were with apple). So, then they were told that there was a wedding group at the premier lobby (which was a different wedding) and some of them went over to that lobby. But they all arrived safely. At the wedding site, Alana told me she had forgotten to bring the copy of my hand ceremony. So, she sent someone back to get it and it wasn't a problem. So, for the real fun...I don't know if it is the time of day or a change in weather, but there were tons of little flies (non-biting little black m-fers) that were all over the beach. They loved me and all my flowers. My DH said he pretended like he was one of those little kids in Ethiopia that always seem to have flies on them but don't care. I HATE bugs. I did my very best to ignore them. At one point, the minister (who was a completely adorable old man) stopped and had me put down my flowers, then he asked if any of our guests smoke. Of course, my friend Frank, who introduced Dave & I, is a smoker. He had him come up and smoke a cigarette and blow smoke all over me. It was hilarious. It only worked for a little while. So, needless to say, I skipped the hand ceremony since I just couldn't take another second. I will have to watch the video since I hardly remember any of the ceremony. So, after that, we got some pics on the beach and headed to the Mediterranean restaurant for dinner. We basically had half the restaurant and for the first hour at least, it was just us. On the ride over, my DH realized that nobody had grabbed his bag that was on one of the chairs. In this bag was all of our room keys (and they put the room number on the key for some unknown reason), and the safe key (and I had our lap top and $650 in cash). Gone for good. So, I was rather stressed out for most of dinner worrying about our moola. (Don't worry, everything turned out ok, they changed our door lock and later drilled our safe open and gave us a new safe key without charging us the $100 fee.) Then my new SIL found out that somehow, all the recent pics that they had taken in there camera were erased while in her husband's pocket. So we decided to go directly to the bar for some tequila. We all just drank and danced in the premier lobby bar until it was time to go to the disco. We had a blast dancing and partying. My SIL is a wild child (she is "the fun Burke" according to my DH and his brother). She pretended like she was going to drive us home from the disco and was revving the engine on the hacienda bus. Then after they yelled at her, she was getting on the radio and saying "Hola! Hola! Hola!" It was hysterical and of course, sealed the deal. My family officially loves her. The rest of the week was much more relaxing and was great to get to hang out with our family and friends. We spent a lot of time at the pool bars and hanging out drinking in the lobbies playing games or cards. The premier lobby has faster drink service and live music at 8pm. We were allowed to eat at all the restaurants on property but only ate at the Coba buffets. For a la cartes, we ate at Le Gourmet, Mikado, Arlequin and Tequila. They did not count our wedding dinner against our guests a la cartes, nor do they seem to check that closely. We would reserve for a group of 10 and they would only have our room number. The food was delicious. Our rooms were all junior suites and nice. They did towel art and decorated our room with rose petals. We were on a delayed schedule for some reason and didn't get our rose petals or honeymoon t-shirts until the day after wedding. We did get a fruit basket on the 2nd night and champagne on our wedding day. That's it for now, time to go work on the pictures some more. Michael Maurus was our photog and got some really nice pictures. I will get some posted. I did start a group photo album on photobucket.com that people are starting to upload photos to. Login to a private Photobucket.com album The password is mexico if you are asked. My sister uploaded some pictures already.

Having just returned from my wedding...I say all hair up. I had them pull a few strands down around my face and curl them. Those pieces lasted 5 minutes before they lost their curls (and I have curly hair) and the wind blew them all over and they look funny in the pictures when they are blowing around. I really wish I had just left them all up.