navarrabrooke

Quote: Originally Posted by egsarah Brooke, I am going through DWT also. So far my travel agent has been great! We booked our travel, wedding, and honeymoon arangements through them and they were the same price as orbitz, expedia, and apple vacations when we booked. She said that she would match when it was apples to apples comparissons but I don't really know what the means since we haven't even sent out our STDs yet. ( I know I'm behind). I'll let you know what I experience as people begin to book. No worries! Thanks! I'm hearing the same thing - "apples to apples" - and I don't really know what that means either - sounds sorta vague to me. When we booked our travel it was about the same, but now it's $500 cheaper on Orbitz, sorta wish we would have waited to book since travel rates keep getting lower and lower it seems. I'm not really seeing the value in having a TA. I assumed they would have unique access to the best deals and alert us to them so we could pass them on to our guests. But instead my guests and I are finding these deals online and trying to get her to match them. I feel like we're doing all the work! But I am grateful these travel deals are out there! ;>)

Quote: Originally Posted by becks We had a several families that had more than 2 kids. The rule is 2 kids + 2 adults max in a room - they will not price them any other way. We just booked the extra kids into grandparents' rooms and then let them sleep wherever they wanted. I can't remember if the rooms with 2 double beds have pull-out couches or not. some of the couches pull out, others don't. But they also have roll-away beds. I think that as long as the kids are all accounted for (meaning book them into rooms with grandparents/aunts/friends/etc.) you'll be okay. Great - I think that's what we'll do then. Good to know about the roll-away beds too - I had wondered about that. And thanks for the encouragement about the guest not booking yet! My biggest concern right now is with our guests getting the best travel deals. With this economy there are such great travel offers out there on Orbitz, Expedia, etc. When I had brought this to our TA's attention a few weeks ago, she said they would "try" to match them. Orbitz is posting the best offer I've seen yet. They are advertising 40% off and the cheapest room - the Deluxe Junior Suite - is $240/nt. (last I had checked it was $320/nt) In addition to that, kids 12 & under stay and eat for free! That is a huge savings, especially for my sister traveling with her 4 kids. I have a call in to our TA, waiting to hear back if she can match it. I'm also thinking of booking my sister's stay at the resort through Orbitz and the air travel through our TA. Not sure if we can use another travel company at this point since we have already booked our travel package with DWT, have a wedding website up on their site and have already sent out the Save the Dates with this information. This part can be so stressful! Thanks for all your insight and advice!

I know we have some time - our wedding is 7 months away, but I'm getting nervous about our guests not booking. We sent out the Save the Dates in early March and though many have received travel quotes, no one has booked their travel. Can anyone give me an idea of when they started to see guests booking their travel? Also, is anyone else using Destination Wedding Travel? A friend of a friend referred them to me and though our agent has been great, I'm seeing that their pricing for air and hotel are not as low as Orbitz or Expedia. Actually one of my guests brought this to my attention just a few weeks ago. I just checked again today and Orbitz is offering 40% off - a significant savings from some of the earlier quotes. Some of my VIP guests are the ones hit hardest by this ecomony and they are looking for the best travel deal. Does anyone have any advice to offer? Did all of your guests book through your travel agent or did some book through an online discounter such as Orbitz or Expedia? Also, my sister has 4 kids and I was told the Paradisus only allows 2 kids with 2 adults per room, so my sister and brother-in-law would have to get 2 rooms which would almost double the cost of the trip. But I know the resort has Family Suites with 2 double beds and a sofa bed which would accomodate her family. Has anyone else run into this? Sorry for all the questions - all of this has just consumed me lately. I appreciate any advice you can give! Thanks! Brooke

Congratulations, newlyweds! We also had a difficult time selling my future in-laws on our plans for a destination wedding in Mexico - they were not too thrilled with the idea initially. Fortunately, though, they have come around. I think the key was including my FMIL in the planning, making her feel a part of it as much as we could. And we really reinforced the idea of both of our families on vacation together for a week-long celebration instead of for one night. I think the pictures of the resort helped too!

Love the pictures, Kelly - that's exactly what we want! And thanks for Ajua weddings, I will definitely look into them too.

Thanks for all the helpful information! I will look into it and let ya'll know how it goes.

Thanks for all the helpful information! I will look into it and let ya'll know how it goes.

Thanks, Kelly! Great idea with the Bose. We're planning for about the same amount of people - around 30. Where was your reception? We're doing ours on the Reef Grill deck - the Chill Out chic package with buffet.

Hi there - I am new to the forum and also a Paradisus bride. We just firmed up our date and location earlier this month with Perla. Now we're starting to concentrate on the details - in particular the music. Instead of doing live music (which would be our first choice) or a DJ, we are considering going the iPod route. Though I did receive a quote from Luis at Swank for $1466. But after reading some of the earlier posts, does this mean even if I don't use them I will be billed for 15% of the original quote? Also, is $1466 for 4 hours reasonable? We would love to do live music, but $1200 for 45 minutes is unfortunately not within our budget. Is anyone doing live music and able to find a better deal? If we do go with the iPod, can anyone tell me what arrangements we will need to make? We'll need a sound system of course. We also would like to do a projection screen so we can air a photo slideshow during the cocktail hour and buffet and then play our favorites music DVDs for the dance party - sorta like a concert experience. I have asked about this from Perla, but have not heard back. Do we use Swank for the equipment or does the resort take care of that? Any advice you can give is very much appreciated!!! Happy to have found and be a part of this forum! Thanks! Brooke

OK, so it looks like posting my avatar pic did work after all - even though it told me "invalid file." And I'm officially a "noob", not a "lurker" anymore! Things are looking up!

This forum seems to have a wealth of information, but I'm having a tough time navigating through it all and I keep running into issues. I've even read up on all the helpful "newbie" information - FAQs, general info, etc, but I keep getting error messages. I've been trying to upload a picture for my profile, avatar and siggy using the appropriate image specs - even used photobucket since the forum's image host is down, but nothing seems to work. Each time I try to search a forum, I get a strange error message asking me to wait a certain amount of seconds to perform the search. I am trying not to get frustrated, but I understand there are some pretty strict rules on this forum and I'd like to work out the bugs so I can participate and get the most out of this online community. If anyone has any feedback or advice I'd love to hear it - thanks! Brooke

Love this forum!