Amy, I decided not to have my wedding at Sapphire. I was sure it was going to be the place, but once I visited we both realized a big resort wedding is not want we wanted. I saw some beautiful weddings there and it seemed like the brides and guests had a wonderful time there. There just was not enough privacy for me. We both laugh because the picture they have on the website of the the view of the hotel with the green all around it was photoshopped. This is partly our fault, because we had not been to Mexico before. We did not realize that they photoshopped the other resorts out. So it is resort next to resort, one after the other. Plus they all do weddings too. Having seen that picture I thought it was a more remote location than Cancun. However looking back at other pictures of resorts they all do this on their website too. That being said we debated and debated, and decided to rent a car and drive an hour and half to Tulum. My fiancé's biggest request was he wanted and amazing beach. Tulum's beaches had crystal clear water and no seaweed. I am not that picky and found Sapphire's beach to be just fine, but there was seaweed all in the water so you would come out with it on you and it was on the sand. They do clean it up with a tractor about 5 times a day. We decided to do our wedding in a smaller venue. In Tulum they have a stretch of roads that leads to the ruins called route 109. All up and down are boutique hotels with cabanas on the beach. This was just more personal for us. I hope this does not make you feel like Sapphire is not the right place. It was beautiful and we did go back and forth about it. I had a beautiful and relaxing vacation there. Heather, I am planning on using outside photographers: some that I have looked into are La Luna (less expensive than Del sol), Claudia Rodriguez, Diego Munoz. I am still researching some more too. I would be careful if budget is an issue on using any outside vendors. It is $300 for every outside vendor you use including photography. So you are looking at an extra $900 in just fees for photos, flowers, and DJ. I saw the flowers they use there and they were beautiful. She said you do not have to get one of the flowers arrangements from their booklet. If you have something in mind send it to her she will look into how they can do it for you. Basically you can get whatever you want as long as they have those flowers in season. If it is a little more money then you will just have to pay the difference. I also heard the resort DJ and saw him at a reception. I made sure to ask if he was the "resort one." He sounded pretty good to me and had a cool light up floor too. Another thing asked about was how much every person over the 25 would cost for the reception in the "divine package." Anel told me $99 per person plus 11% tax and 15% service fee. The eternity packages is $94 plus the same fees. A cool thing she let me know about is they are doing a rehearsal dinner special right now. For $20 a person in a cool area by the fountains on the terrace. It includes 2 hours of service, 3 course dinner, white linens and chairs, open bar service, sound system and microphone, and a champagne toast. They do not allow groups of more than 10 to sit together at the restaurants, and some of the nights there was a 40min wait. So I thought this was a really good option. Please let me know of anymore questions. Even though I decided to not go with Sapphire, I did ask a lot of questions and see a bunch of weddings so I would be happy to help. I also went to dinner at Jade and walked into Dreams Resort (which is two resorts down) Excellence, and Azul Sensatori. If anyone has questions about those. Happy planning! Molly
These are some pictures I promised I would post of some of the resort and wedding setups I saw when I was there on my site inspection trip.