Pazoop

Congrats and thank you so much for sharing your pictures! They are wonderful and you are a beautiful bride! I'm planning my wedding for January 2009 at Las Caletas and I love that I am amassing this incredibly huge file of photos and slide shows to show my family and friends to get them so excited to join us!!! I would love to hear more details about your day...I especially loved the way you set up the tables at the reception (with the brown table runners and napkins and the colorful centerpieces). Was that you or was that Nicole and/or Kelley?

There's also a Dreams Riviera Nayarit scheduled to open sometime in mid-2008. Since I'm planning to have my wedding at Las Caletas next January 2009 I've made several inquires to try and get more information about the new Dreams hotel but haven't been able to get any information from travel agents, tour operators, or the Dreams company. I'll update if I hear anything new.

WOW! WOW! WOW! Those photographs are absolutely stunning! The artistry is incredible! You really get a sense of the surroundings and the emotion of the day (you look beautiful and so blissfully happy...I love the smile on your face in so many of the reception photos)! Congrats on a beautiful wedding and on having such wonderful photos to remember it with!

Thanks everyone for the stair information and especially for being willing to recap it! I know that a lot of this information is probably posted earlier in this thread but I can't figure out how to search within a thread. I've tried running searches like "Las Caletas + stairs" but it just turns up this thread as an answer for me and there are lots of pages I still have to go through. I think my co-workers are getting suspicious of this page being on my computer too often! :-) I am so grateful that it's all available though! I don't know why I was under the impression that there were so many more stairs than people are describing? And that the stairs were really steep? Maybe I'm only thinking of the photos leading up and down from the bridal casita? Jamy, thank you for your description of your guest. That sounds exactly like mine and so I feel much better. I am the worst for second guessing and "what ifs" so I am thinking of all these worst case scenarios now in advance and trying to troubleshoot them. At a certain point I know I need to let go and just decide this is the wedding I want and the rest I will just have to say "if I want it to happen I will make it happen" one way or the other. That's going to be my new mantra from now on!

Yikes! 5 weddings in one week! That has to be exhausting! Well, so that I don't trouble the LC WC's - I'm hoping the LC brides and those who have done site visits to LC can help me out with this question - Were the stairs an issue for any of your guests or you think the stairs could potentially be an issue for older guests or guests who have some limited mobility issues (I have a guest with a bad knee who walks with a cane - this person goes up and down a single flight of stairs in her home on a daily basis but it's an effort)? I am starting to wonder if a site visit would really be a necessity for me given the needs of some of our guests. I really love LC because of its remote qualities and terrain but I don't know if it will match the needs of the family members/guests. I will be so disappointed if it's an issue. Thanks!

Hi all! I guess I am in the same situation that Evonut was originally in...I am an American with a Canadian fiance living in Toronto. Because I was attending grad school up here and we were living together for two years (and luckily had documentation including joint lease, bank accounts, shared credit cards, etc. long before we got engaged), my FI was able to sponsor me for Canadian Permanent Residency as his "common law partner". The definition of common law under the Immigration Act is living together for one year consecutively - no idea why. I had to fill out an INSANE amount of paperwork, get family members to complete statutory declarations, go through an FBI background check, and have a full medical exam completed by a specific certified physician. I did not hire a lawyer but often wish I did. I have not been approved yet but it can take up to 1.5 years to process through the Buffalo, New York office. We're planning to get married in Mexico and my FI wanted to have the legal ceremony there....I told him NO WAY am I looking into trying to figure out how that would work! We are getting legally married at city hall in Toronto. I appreciate having this thread because we have not decided that Toronto is our permanent home base and have been talking about trying to get my FI legal status in the US after we are married. If anyone reading this ever wants to know about doing it in reverse (applying in Canada), just let me know and I'd be glad to try and help. Otherwise, I can just offer support and understanding about how anxiety producing and frustrating and LONG the immigration process is....

I didn't realize that our host was a TA! There is so much information on this forum and only so many non-work hours in the day! :-) I hadn't really considered using someone who wasn't local only because I'm typically a very hands on person...this whole DW planning thing is actually very scary for me, not being able to see the site, do hair trials before, etc. But I'm willing to roll with it all so that I can have the wedding my FI and I really want rather than a "technically" perfect day....and it may work out to be both! I will send Tammy an email/private message tomorrow and ask her how this could work. Thank you for the information. Julia

Hello! I've noticed in a couple of profiles that there are other women on this forum planning their DW's from Toronto just like me! I'm in the early stages of planning my DW at Las Caletas in Puerto Vallarta next year (January 09) but I have guests coming down from Toronto AND all over the States so I will definitely need a good travel agent. I also set on going the all-inclusive route too because I know my guests will all be a lot happier that way. Does any have a travel agent or travel company they're working with (or have worked with in the past) that they love and that's either based out of the Toronto area? Thanks!

Thanks for the really quick replies! They actually do help a lot. We anticipate having about 50 guests (but MAX 60) so that's great that they can all fit under the canopy for dinner!). And it sounds like the boat ride might not be such a big deal....the person I'm really, really worried about is my future mother-in-law but I think I'll have her come with us in the morning on the shorter ride. I think she'd enjoy being with the "girls" that day especially since her daughter (my future sister-in-law) and grand-daughter (future neice) are both in the wedding party. And I like you idea Ann of having 1" heels AND wedges...that way I leave my options open and can kick off my shoes if I want anyway!...I don't plan on spending much on the shoes anyway and am hoping I can find a pair that can be dyed another color later for reuse! :-)

My mom loved it (with a few questions/reservations - see below)! And we showed it to my FI's sister and her husband too and they both loved it as well. So now we're getting really excited. I just have to contact the travel agent to figure out hotel stuff for that same week before we put down a deposit and finalize everything else! My mom thought the pictures looked beautiful and loved the setting but asked me a few legitimate questions that I couldn't answer for her. I tried looking through other posts on this thread but there are so many and it seems that LC is continuing to update the site all the time. So, here goes - 1. THE BOAT RIDE - The concerns are how many people tend to get sea sick on the catamaran ride over? I've read mixed things on this board, with some people saying they partied on the boat and others saying they were sick so it's hard to get a sense of how rough/calm the water is or can be. Is there an alternative to taking the catamaran at least over to the island for people who are really likely to get sick? Like a water taxi that shortens the trip to less than 1 hour? 2. SHOES - The woman in my family are a little obsessed with them...think Carrie on Sex and the City (I am, after all, originally from NYC :-) ! ). My mother took one look at that thatched aisle/dance floor and all she thought about what - What shoes could you/me/your sister/etc. possibly wear? I think I would be fine barefoot (but I do kind of love shoes too!) but I know she would like to see shoes on my feet and she's caved on everything else... (Also, please realize this would in no way be a deal breaker! I'm only half serious about the shoe obsession) So what have people done about shoes? If I found a pair of low (around 1" inch) squared heels (not pointed) do you think those would work and not poke through? 3. TABLE SET UP - How many tables fit underneath the roof? I think the adults (and by that I mean my parents, my FI's parents, and our older relatives) will prefer to be seated under there because it has a slightly more formal/traditional feel to it. Our friends and cousins, etc. will love sitting on tables out nearer to the beach if necessary. Did anyone else find that the covered seating area felt more formal? Thank you for all the help! I'm not going to contact the travel agent about booking rooms at Dreams PV!

THIS NEWBIE IS NO LONGER UNDECIDED Hello! First, I'm still overwhelmed by the welcome I got to this forum! So once again, thank you! Second, I heard back from Kelley at LC!!! My FI loved everything I showed him about the place so thankfully, Jamy, no thumb-breaking necessary! LOL! But I might have gone there if necessary... No, he immediately agreed that pictures conveyed how private and intimate the setting is, and I told him about all the positive things everyone here has to say about the WC... I think I actually yelped out loud when I saw Kelley's email yesterday! That's when I realized I had gone from a maybe to a definitely, yes...this is where I want to get married! No doubt! Of course, I'm now waiting to get my mother feedback. Poor thing, I think I just sent her four emails worth of information and about 25 different links....I know that it's my wedding and not hers, and no where in this process so far has she tried to tell me at all what to do (in fact, I think secretly she's disappointed with the entire DW thing altogether but will NEVER say it)...but her opinion matters to me, I want her to love it too...because it will be some much more fun planning this if she's as excited and pumped as I am...

Wow! Thanks for such a warm welcome! Ann - Your slide show photos and video are incredible! Thank you so much for sharing them. Rachel - I see that your wedding date at Las Caletas (LC? - I'm still getting used to writing in acronyms...) is coming up really fast....you must be so excited!!! Well...as I said in my intro post... 1. I still have some decisions/planning/convincing to do but I think my mind and my heart just know THIS IS THE PLACE! The same way people say you'll just know the dress when you put it on...(I found my dress so I know that feeling!) AND 2. Even though I love it I still have tons of questions about the LC packages that people have arranged. It's hard to get a sense of what the set up would look like with only the things included in the base price, and I'm trying to get an idea of budget, etc. (One thing I do know for CERTAIN is that my FI will want the fire dancers...he'll be SO EXCITED when I show him!) Anyway, once I know more about my specific questions I will start a separate post in the PV thread. Just wanted to say THANKS AGAIN AND AGAIN for the support. I'm the only person I know doing a DW so it's nice to have some connections now!

Oh, sorry! -- My name is Julia...I forgot that I used an IM name as my user name.

Hello everyone! First of all, please let me say that I cannot tell you how happy I am to have found this forum. I live in Toronto, Canada and have been engaged for two months now. I'm planning my DW for January 29, 2009 and expect approx 60 guests to be coming from Toronto, New York, Michigan, and California. The initial planning has been overwhelming and finding this forum has been a miracle!!! THANK YOU! The original plan in December was to have our DW in the Riviera Maya...I grew up on the East coast in the States and loved the white sandy Caribbean beaches...BUT after lurking on the Puerto Vallarta boards here for the last two weeks (I know lurking and not posting isn't nice, I'm sorry) I think my mind has been changed.... I HAVE TOTALLY FALLEN IN LOVE WITH LAS CALETAS!!!...it is absolutely INCREDIBLE! It's like someone took the dream image I've had of my DW and brought it to life. I've looked at the beatiful slide shows and photographs that the generous, wonderful ladies on this site have posted and have just continued to fall harder for the location. I have many questions, know absolutely NOTHING about the surrounding area of PV, and am not certain if my fiance will go for the change in location, but I hope that others can help me out in this area. Feel free to ask me questions if I've forgotten to provide more information. This is the first occassion EVER that I've had to become part of an online community so it's totally new to me. Thank you.