ROR Review; Pic Heavy

[sweetluna]

Hey Everyone,

 

We got married on Nov 12, 2010 and it was AWESOME!!!

 

First, if you are considering this resort, you won't be disappointed.  We had several guests arrive to the resort a couple of days before and they were emailing us telling how great everything is there and they were having a great time.  For the rest of the week all of our guests were telling us how they were thankful we picked such a wonderful resort.  We had 24 guests between the ages of 2 - 65.  Everyone had an amazing time!

 

The resort is big but we never had problems finding people when we needed to.  My family came from across the country so it was nice to meet up with my dad and sister every morning for breakfast.  (my husband and I live in New Brunswick, my dad & g/f live in Ontario, and my sister & brother-in-law live in Alberta so having everyone in one location was so much fun!)

 

The resort staff is amazing.  We had some very minor issues but we talked to front desk and it was always resolved right away.  No problem!   Just a quick tip that we learned - bring luggage locks because you might not have a safe key right away. To get a safe key the trick is to go to the front desk around the time people are checking out (usually early morning).

 

The food is decent and there is a ton of choices.  The meal we had for our wedding was OUTSTANDING!!! I didn't bother standing in line for the specialty restaurants - it wasn't how I wanted to spend my vacation - BUT our guests chose to stand in line and asked if we wanted to have dinner with them so they reserved a place for us - super cool!  So I did get to try Sir Richard and the chinese restaurants.  Sir Richard is good - a little "uppity" for my liking but it was nice.  I didn't like the chinese one at all.  I'm not a huge seafood fan and that's mostly what they had.  St. Anne's buffet was the best because you didn't have to make reservations and I met up with our guests so we never had to eat alone if we didn't want to.

 

Ok, so the part you're probably wondering about, the wedding.  I dealt with Keisha, the wedding coordinator - never seen or heard from anyone named Tony/Antonette - but I did sometimes deal with Keisha's assistant, Michael.   Both were fabulous to deal with!  I didn't go with anything fancy.  We had a few decorations, we wrote our ceremony, and we were going with the free flowers because I had my bridesmaids flowers made at home. (one bridesmaid is allergic to flowers so we made them fake)  I had one of my guests assigned to help with the decorating of the reception table and ensure that the programs were placed on the chairs at the ceremony.  The wedding coordinators will let you store your stuff in their office but you have to assign one of your guests to help with the set up, they don't do it all.  Please don't expect to be able to do it yourself, there is just too much going on that it is better to ask one of your guests to take charge of that and just let him/her know what you want.  Your person can help Keisha to make sure it is exactly how you want it.

 

The spa is filled with wonderful, professional, friendly staff who really want to make you feel special on your day.  (or any day for that matter)   I had them to my nails, hair and makeup and I was SOO impressed with all their work.  I tend to go to higher end spa here at home so I found some of their methods were a little dated but the results were soo very good.  

 

We were supposed to get married at the garden gazebo but it rained so they moved us to Mammee Bay instead.  It was great, actually better then I had planned.  Our wedding was scheduled for 2pm so I was worried about our guests sitting under direct sunlight.  This was a much better location/option.   Just a note:  in some of the threads here it mentions that the brown plastic chairs is what you get in the free package but I found out the white fold up chairs are also included in the free package if you want to use them instead. Also, after the ceremony they serve rum punch to all of your guests for free. (regular punch for the kids)

 

We hired the steel drum band to play at the ceremony and it was the BEST money we spent.  We didn't have any specific songs in mind so we asked them to play traditional carribean music, I told them I wanted something really authenitic.  There are not enough adjectives in the english language to truely describe how great they were.  We had people from all over the resort come check them out as they played (although they were also very respectful to keep their distance since it was our wedding)  Our guests are still talking about how awesome the steel drums were.

 

We hired the resort photographer.  He did a good job but we did have our neice shadow him and take a lot of the same pictures.  I'm a little disappointed that it will take 12 weeks to get the high res/photoshoped pictures back but from what I understand that is pretty common with a lot of the photographers.  

 

Basically, it was a great day.  Even though we went with very simple wedding, our guests had a great time and said it was one of the best weddings they had been to.  We let the scenery be our main decoration.

 

[mrs*j*2011]

I love the picture of you and your bridesmaids - you all look so happy!  Is your dress by Mori Lee?  It looks like my dress (# 4511) and its so nice to see someone besides the model wearing it!

 

Congrats on your wedding!

[sunstarsmoon]

thanks for sharing, beautiful pictures!

[hiccups]

Thanks for the review!  Pics look great and you look so happy!  I'm disappointed to hear that the staff don't help set up at all.  I had previous arrangements with Chandlyn and she agreed to help with the decor so I went and bought stuff that needs to be set up.  The new WC said that she would "try" to accomodate any previous arrangements but seems like I'll have to get my guests to help out.

[Sallee]

I love the ROR

 

your wedding looked beautiful congratulations

[shelbygirl]

Congrats! Sounds like the steel drums were a hit!  Beautiful dress!

[Tessab123]

Awesome pics and thanks for the detailed review!! im also an ROR bride getting married in may 2011

[eddieandsheila]

Thank you for your awesome review!  You looked beautiful

[surprise4us]

Thank you so much for your review, you look beautiful. I can't believe that I only have a few weeks to go!

I have a couple questions, Did you book your hair appointment before you got there or did you wait? Also how did you bring everything you needed, like decorations?

Thanks

[Rae1]

 hi all my fellow jamaica brides im gettting married in jamaica too our wedding is july but we went down 2 weeks ago its amazing i did my hair and makeup trial i loved it chasity artistry they do airbrush makeup they also have a photographer 876-432-3989 i found them on facebook their prices are so resonable. i also visited my hotel iberostar its great go luck planning