Any 2011 Brides out there?

Welcome Tracy!

 

I am in the process of booking Ceiba del Mar now. Unfortunately the Ceiba thread on here isn't very great, it seems there aren't very many Ceiba brides And I didn't find much else in useful information on this site regarding Ceiba. Diana (the WC there who is amazing, I've never had her take longer than 3 hours to respond to anything!) did tell me that last year they did 35 weddings and they have 40 booked for 2010. I loved that about the resort though, that there won't be another wedding the same day as us, and probably not even the same week! We also love how small it is, we are having a large wedding (70-80 guests) so we expect to take up half of the resort:) We're very excited about that, as it'll make it more private.

 

We weren't able to do a site visit, so we are just choosing the resort off of TripAdvisor reviews and what our TA has told us. Ceiba has a list of "approved" vendors for everything other than food and cake, such as flowers, photography, DJ, etc. The list is LONG, and all of the vendors with the best rec's on this site are on it. So that is good! I love having so many options for these things as well, and I had been avoiding any resort that had rules against outside vendors.

 

We used a TA to get our prices and we now have set prices for room rates for May 2011, which a lot of the larger resorts won't do this early. We did really have to haggle for our prices, and for awhile I thought we were giving up and booking elsewhere, but they finally worked with us just a little bit! It's harder for a boutique hotel to negotiate pricing, as they can't make up the difference elsewhere. With a resort like Dreams, if they give you a big discount, they make up for that money lost on their other rooms or at one of their other 15 resorts. Ceiba can't do that, so it makes sense that they won't negotiate very much. But we loved the resort so much, we finally just settled with a slightly higher rate than we wanted.

 

If you contact the link for wedding info on Ceiba's webpage with any questions that you have, Diana will be very quick to respond to you! But feel free to send me any questions as well. I also looked at Maroma Resort (too expensive!) and Azul Beach (they have a max of 50 people for weddings, or else this would've been our first choice).

This is what Sun Palace has in our contract:

•Bride and Groom must arrive in Cancun at least three (3) working days (Monday – Saturday) prior to the wedding ceremony to meet with the wedding coordinator and submit all documents. Bride & Groom must be at the resort by check-in time (3:00 PM) or earlier in order to consider day of arrival as the first day.
•Witnesses must arrive two (2) working days prior to ceremony. If witnesses are not available, Palace Resorts will provide them at no additional cost.

So, its a must to contact your hotel.

Hi Tracy.Clements, and welcome, congrats on your engagement! We have gone for a bigger hotel but we did look at the boutique style ones and the two you are looking at are beautiful. Good luck with the site visit let us know how it goes......

 

CeeCee76 - Thank you. It seems all hotels may be different. Our witnesses have to be there 4 days prior to the wedding along with the bride and groom. So different to your hotel.... It just shows you it's best to check and double check these things girls.

 

I'm a worrier anyway (you may have already gathered that)!

 

I will let you know what the WC says on her reply!

tracy.clements- congrats and welcome! I got engaged on Christmas day too :-)

I'm sort of in the same boat as you, trying to pick a resort. Right now my top pick is Playacar Palace. It's on the smaller side (200 rooms or so), is literally right next to Playa Del Carmen (we have a lot of partiers that will want to get off the resort, so that was important), and it's gorgeous! I'm really hoping that's where we end up, provided prices work out.

 

We are using a TA, but I will constantly be checking online prices too to make sure we are getting a good deal. As long as we haven't booked yet, he'll match whatever price we see online if it's better than what he offers.

kurly - Congrats on picking a first choice! I think that's the hardest part haha. I loved Playacar Palace, because it isn't huge, has great reviews, and is close to PDC. I also love that chapel on 5th, where Raychel is getting married! Have you chosen a date?

I agree...picking a place is the hardest part. I was going to pick the Barcelo Maya Palace...then I discovered OCEAN TURQUESA/CORAL, it is located in Puerto Morelos (a quiet fishmen village), I went there for snorkeling last year, it is a beautiful place, the beach was better than Playa Del Carmen and the GPB Tulum/Akumal, and the water too. It is closer to the airport and not as touristic like Cancun and PDC. So now..I am back to square one-> pick a place.

FI and I decided after our trip to Sun Palace last year that we wanted to get married there. If actually had to do research and compare it would have taken me forever. I analyze everything to death and then I still can't decide.

yay! I'm hoping "first choice" will turn into "final choice"...Our date is May 7th, 2011. As of right now that date is still open at PP so hopefully we'll be putting down a deposit soon!

I also love that we'll be there on Cinco De Mayo. Our plan is to party in Playa Del Carmen on that night for our bachelor and bachelorette parties.

 

For those of you that are worried about the whole 4 day stay thing you may wanna consider what FI and I are doing. We're getting legally married at home before we leave, so the actual ceremony will just be "symbolic". We're planning on keeping it a secret from everyone, but I may invite my grandparents to come to the legal ceremony since they won't be able to make the trip. I think it will take a lot of stress off and we won't have to worry about taking the blood test.

Prettypigpig - we looked at Oceal Coral & Turquesa as well and we really loved it. However, I was working with destinationweddings.com at the time (they were awwwwwful) and that TA said that the resort gives really bad group rates and they have better prices online. We decided to stop looking at the resort after that. However, since then I had the DW.com specialist send me some outrageous prices for other resorts (including the one we are booking, which she quoted at double what they are charging!). So I realized that DW.com only works with specific resorts, and they'll do/say anything to get you not to book at other resorts that you may like. However, by the time I realized that we'd already decided on Ceiba as our first choice, or else I would've gotten quotes from Ocean C&T from our new TA.

 

So basically, if you are working with DW.com, then contact Ocean C&T directly to get their pricing!

kurly - we are getting married legally at home as well! I have told my parents, but they're the only ones we're telling.

 

On the travel agent topic from above... is everyone here working with a TA, or are some of you doing it all directly with the hotel?