pclama2013

oooops I forgot to say... I planned on making this short, but just couldn't get it all in.. sorry for the lengthy post. LOL

My wife and I are back from our wedding at BBPD. I will keep this short as it looks as if most of the brides here have captured the main details of the wedding there. We had 36 guests, including 4 children. We had our wedding at the Garden Gazebo and the reception at the bar huey. Originally we we dealing with Lianne and she disappeared, meaning no email replies and really no responses for awhile before we left. We showed up and when being assigned our room asked for an upgrade, they did this for us for free, in fact they did this for most of our guests for free! So tell your guests to ask, because you never know. We told the reception that we were getting married and asked about out wedding planner. BTW the English at this resort is weak at best and I used to teach ESL so I know poor English. There were so many misunderstandings that I would recommend that you a should invite a Spanish speaking guest for insurance. We were upgraded to a two level room with a king bed and two singles, two washrooms and two tvs, not brad! This room was located pretty far away from the main area, maybe a 5 to 10 min walk... Which was hard on one of our guests who was in her 80s, so if you have any guests who are not in reasonable shape consider this, and don't forget it is freaking hot and humid. I wish I had a pedometer for this trip, because I am sure it would have rolled over.... A few times. Hoyo 19 is a gem, great a la cart food and great margaritas as well. We had an impromptus dinner there for 10 of our guests and they all loved it. If we knew about this before hand we would have had everyone meet there! We got to our room and spent a hour or so unpacking and getting ready, at this point we thought we decided with a few of our guests to hit the pool, but thought we should speak to the wedding planner first. So we went to the front desk to ask where they were, as they didn't seem concerned about where we were. We eventually found them and they were like ohhh we were calling your room... not sure how true that was, but OK. The summary of our planner, Helen, she was extremely nice and her English was not bad. However I felt she was extremely disorganized. We had to meet with her close to 5 times in the first two days because she failed to get her act together. We gave her a list of the tables, including who was going to be at what table and spellings of names, and she managed to mess this up, excluding one of our guests, and at the wedding when he didn't have a table she was looking at us to explain why we had an extra guest.... This was just one of many things our WC did that made us very confused. We decided that it would be good to have a wedding day itinerary made up for all our guests, as so they know when and where to be, and really so my mother wouldn't freak out not knowing what the plan is. We asked to have them print these out for every guest and had them put them in their package that came with their room keys. BTW they were not going to do this, in fact they were like, just tell your 36 guests to meet at the lobby bar at 4:15 on your wedding day and we will go from there... This would not fly with my family, so I had to take matters into my own hands. The ceremony was very nice and for us almost exactly what we wanted, although they get our guest's name wrong, calling him Dan instead of David... ohh so close. BTW did I mention that it was hot and humid? I am pretty white and of Nordic decent so this is hard on a guy like me, so if the heat doesn't bother you this is right up your alley. When the ceremony was over we had photos, with Tropical Pictures, who were very professional and did a great job!! however they do pull a sneaky move to get you spend more money, if you buy a package with 100 photos they will take like 150 pics, and then ask you to select them or..... you can pay more money to have all of them. And, trust me you want them, as it is hard to choose they were all really nice. As you can guess we paid. haha After the ceremony is where our WC really started dropping the ball. Our guests were very confused where to go and what to do, as my new wife and I were off taking pictures they were supposed to be enjoying appys and relaxing getting ready for the reception. Many of the guys were so hot they wanted to change, but were unsure of how much time they had before the reception as a result the start time was late and our WC didn't have any answers. When we got back from the photo shoot the guests were scattered all over, and the WC was asking where my best man was saying he decided to go back to his room... everything was delayed. In the end, I felt like I had to make sure our DJ and MC were on the same page and that we were moving along. The food came out slow and really, considering we were behind schedule you would think it would be ready. From then on it was pretty smooth and although we got everything we wanted in, it felt rushed because we didn't start eating until 730, an hour behind schedule and after the toasts and dinner it was close to 930... We had enough time to have our first dance and one song and they were like OK time is up... but she did offer on the spot we could continue at $17 per person per hour... we declined. We called it and had everyone meet at the Carey bar and kept the party going from there. As you may be able to tell, I wasn't too happy with our WC, but overall the wedding was great despite her. The upside, our guests other than David barely noticed and loved it!! All of them said the wedding was beautiful and they had a great time!! So who cares!! Overall we also loved it!! I think for this kind of wedding this is par for the course and you have to learn how to roll with the punches. Most of the guests said this was the best resort they had been to, and the food was great for the most part. The resort is huge and has a lot to offer guests in the way of entertainment. They are liberal with the drinks in general very polite. The resort was also very clean and kept this way. Everyone loved the excursions, I did the ATV excursion and it was good fun!! Guests were playing tennis, shuffle board and volleyball. My friends who brought their kids loved the Pirates Bay Water Park, which is extra, but they spent 6 hours there one day. So for $10 a head that isn't bad. And really, they have a free water park which all the kids enjoyed. The shows are also appropriate for kids and they particularly enjoyed the circus show. I give this resort credit as they are constantly asking for feedback, and I am happy to give it. I shared this response with my WC, and wasn't sure if she cared or not, but couldn't resist the opportunity. I don't plan on returning to this board much, so if you have any questions feel free to email our account, [email protected].

hey girls, just wondering if any of you considered/opted to use a local florist instead of the hotel florist? Is this even allowed?

Hi JRM426, Your wedding looked beautiful! THanks for the review, that will really help us in our wedding planning. How many guests were at each table? We are curious at how many centerpeices we would need. Thanks!

Thanks for posting the prices for Tropical Pictures, but I wasn't able to see them. Can you put them in a post? or is it too hard? If so can you email me the list? [email protected]. Thanks