cariandnick

we got married at moon palace in november - our recepiton was outdoors on a terrace and it was perfect - they set the tables basically around the edge and we danced in the middle. honestly, i wouldnt worry about things until you get there - have things planned in your mind about what exactly you want, but they have so many weddings that you wont get a lot of info until you get there and they so absolutely WONDERFUL when you get there. there was nothing that we didnt get addressed once we were there. you can see pics from our wedding at the link here Cari and Nick sometimes the pics help more than anything. if you have an indoor reception, they will make sure they place the tables how you want them and vice versa for outdoors. if you have specific music that you want, i would recommend bringing an ipod and just hooking it up to their speakers - thats what we did so that we had all the music that we wanted. only $150 for the night. moon palace is awesome!

Yeah, we love that song too - it was what we danced to for our "first dance". Its called "simple as it should be" and is by tristan Prettyman. its on her twentythree album

hey all - haven't been on here in awhile but we got married over thanksgiving 2007 at moon palace and it was absolutely perfect. our ceremony was a 4 pm, then free champagne toast after that and then because we booked directly through the resort and booked over 10 rooms we got the free cocktail hour. we then added on open bar for the remainder of the night at $3 per person. we had free reception from 5-6 then open bar till 10 pm. there was so much food for the cocktail hour left over (they keep replacing all the food for the first hour) then they leave the remainder out for the rest of the reception. we brought our own ipod and rented speakers/mic for $150 for the night. it was perfect. on a terrace right next to the ocean. great lighting that comes with it etc. here's a link to our wedding pics but i'm pretty sure its about ready to expire Cari and Nick give it time though because sometimes it takes a little while to load before anything comes up. if it has expired, you can always see some of the pics by going to elizabethmedinaphotography.com and click on wedding blogs then scroll to the bottom and click on dec 2007 and then scroll down to cari and nick moon palace cancun. regarding outside photographers, they do NOT allow outside photographers and make it very clear so hwat i did is i paid for her hotel the night of the wedding and said she was a guest of ours. they never really asked and it wasnt a problem. regarding the wedding coordinators, they work everything out once you get down there and they do so many of these that there's nothing that gets overlooked. just make sure you book your gazebo/time and if you want a reception or not ahead of time and everything else is worked out down there. we didn't even talk to our wedding coordinator until we got down there. ours was nancy arroyo and she was absolotely fabulous. btw, carolina lopez is not an actual wedding coordinator at the moon palace - she is just the main coordinator in terms of scheduling the site for ceremony/reception. she's not who you actually deal with once you get down to the moon palace - she's in miami.

Cari and Nick here is a link to our wedding pics at the Moon Palace over Thanksgiving 2007. Not sure how long the link will last, but hope this helps anyone trying to get a feel for the resort. The first pics were taken the morning of the wedding at the resort and then the wedding/reception pics are obviously after that. Can't say enough about how fabulous elizabeth medina was (our photographer). we loved the MOon palace as well and wouldn't have changed a thing!! if this link expires, you can always see some of our pics by going to elizabeth medina's website elizabethmedinaphotography.com and then click on wedding blogs then scroll down to the very bottom of the page where it says archives (sometimes takes a while) and click on the Dec 2007 link. scroll down to cari and nick moon palace and a smattering of our pics are there forever i believe.

So I just want to update this again now that we'va had our wedding. ELIZABETH IS WORTH EVERY PENNY AND MORE for anyone debating!!!! She was so discrete and easy to work with on the actual day of the wedding. My husband and I are not the most photogenic people, particularly for the posed pictures and we always end up looking fake and forced and our pictures turned out WONDERFUL because she's doing such a good job of taking great shots when you're just talking and alughing with each other. Her shots are so artistic and creative. Every time we look at the slideshow, we feel like we're reliving the day again because the pictures portray so much of the emotion and personalities of our guests, and thats what we really wanted. For anyone worried about using an outside photographer at Moon Palace, we just paid for her to stay a night there and we got absolutely no questions about her at all. It wasn't even brought up. ps, the pics i uploaded into avatar etc are not elizabeths, because i dont have the acutal digital prints from her yet. not that these are bad (my friend took them) but i dont want ppl to think that these were from her.

WE're getting married at MP in ONE MONTH (11/24/07)!!!!!!!!!!!!! Can't freakin wait. In response to the free private functions, don't know what proposal you have, because you may have a special one that you have arranged with your travel agent. We booked directly through the moon palace, and we get a free cocktail hour for everyone who also books through our wedding party at MP. We have to pay $22 per person for everyone who doesn't book through the moon palace. its like $45pp i think for the buffet and $56pp for sit down meal. we pay an additional $3pp for each hour we extend beyond our initial free hour but that only includes drinks. we actually decided to dp 2 hours of hors d oeurves so first hour is free and second is $22pp then we are extending an addl hour with just drinks for $3 pp. we heard there is a ton of food for hors d oerves (know im not spelling that right and dont care :0 )so we decided not to go with the buffet or sit down. i do know there are certain travel agencies that can negotiate potentially better private function deals, and we actually looked into one of them initially, but the wording in our contract was a little vague and they couldnt alter it simply because they only have a standard contract, so we decided to just go through the resort. but im sure that it would have worked out fine regardless. we are having 44 people come, but we initially thought up to 65 might come and they could fit all of us on the garden terrace for the cocktail hour, if that helps... will hopefully get some pics in here after the wedding and have more helpful info.

oh my gosh lenita - everything looked perfect! you guys looked beautiful and your recption looked so fun! ahhhhh im so jealous and you're getting me so excited! so it sounds like the free ceremony that comes with the package is super fast - 5 min. they dont really read vows or anything, huh? i guess maybe we'll just have my uncle or someone also recite vows and people do some readings or something. i want a fast wedding ceremony, but 5 min is a little fast for even me! hahaha. how did you guys decide on the nizuc side - was it just automatically assigned to you?

ohmiGOD those are hilARIOUS! i love the last one!!!!! i wish we could see some from a couple minutes later when he's looking at lenita again with a new frisky mischeivous look in his eye! hahahah!

Quote: Originally Posted by MikkiStreak I'm curious how the beach looks and well maintained it is. I know someone who was there for an extended weekend last weekend and she said they aren't maintaining it like they used to--- (ie, they only cleaned the beach of seaweed twice in about 5 days). Also, she said that now that they are doing weddings on the hour all day long, that they are getting more strict about bringing in outside venders. In fact, at the wedding she attended, MP kicked out the photographer the couple had brought with them. oh my god! are you serious? do you know who the photographer was? we are having an outside photographer too (elizabeth medina) and i will be crushed if she can't come. (partly because i already put down the deposit and partly because i don't want stress that day and mostly because i want to have her as my photographer!)

yay lenita! have fun! take lots of pics and relax.......can't wait to hear from you when you get back!

in case anyone in wondering, i just have to give some HUGE props to elizabeth if anyone is debating whether or not to use her. she has been NOTHING but the most flexible sweet person ever! we almost had a huge clusterf**with our resort, but elizabeth has been so flexible and we are (hopefully) going to be able to work around it! she gets back to you very quickly and is so responsive! i love her!

hey! we're getting married at the moon palace in november and believe me, it took a LOT of deliberation! lenita (andreslove), andrea (onelove) and shelley (gunde) are all getting married there and can also provide lots of useful info. the thing that really made me feel better about it was looking at lots of pictures. the most helpful was going to webshots.com and typing in moon palace wedding and just looking through all the pictures. the other place we were deciding between was el dorado royale, and its GORGEOUS and a lot more private and secluded, but we want to have a loud and crazy reception and have lots of stuff to do on the days we're not getting married, and just felt like moon palace had more to offer from that standpoint. free tours from MP, MP has a disco and lots of restaurants that you dont have to have reservations at (this could be good or bad, depending on your personality...for us and knowing our guests, we're the type of people who don't tend to plan ahead and are more spur of the moment people so knowing we could go to the restaurants at anytime (although you do still have to wait in line sometimes, which is what you would expect from any restaurant). EDR is gorgeous, but it seemed like it might be a little quiet for our tastes (perfect for a honeymoon by yourselves and VERY CLASSY AND ROMANTIC) or a quiet wedding. granted, ive never been to either, and only going by what ive read on this website, tripadvisor, pics on webshots, but thats the gestault i have. there is a post that has a link from one of theknot.com brides in here that has some great info from a bride that got married there last june that i think sort of sealed the deal for me. cant wait till lenita gets married there in 3 weeks to find out more info! hey lenita, btw, you mentioned you talked to some other brides who got married there already...can you pm me their addresses or forward the info that you have from them? that would be AWESOME!!!! sorry i only have these two places to give you info on, but thats what we narrowed it down to and why we ultimately went with MP. oh yeah, and MP allows kids but EDR doesn't - wasnt an issue for us cause we're not having kids coming, but something you would have to consider. oh, and MP is only 20 min from cancun airport, which was important for us for our older guests cause we didnt want to make them spend any more time traveling than they already had by plane! hmmm, i think thats it. from my initial research, i think dreams cancun would be another great option, as has already been mentioned. also consider riu palace mexico, (and some of the other rius) which are cheaper i think and also allow kids. reason we stayed away from those was we didn't want the whole "cancun" thing - we wanted to be a little more secluded and not in the same area as all the spring break type crowd in cancun - that may be a totally unfair stereotype, cause ive never actually been there!!!!! holy crap sorry this is SO LONG!

elizabeth, it must feel great to just have discovered this website and see a million threads with your name in them already! cool!

Quote: Originally Posted by MagsieMexico Ah, that explains why I've seen no pictures... Thanks! My fiance and mum don't like the idea because of how big the hotel is, but it gets such rave reviews, that I gather people don't mind that... yeah, i was kind of nervous for that exact same reason. we were debating btwn mp and EDR for the LONGEST time. it is huge, and may be a little impersonal for that reason, but from pics ive seen, it looks like for the recepiton itself, it can be somewhat secluded, esp if you decide to do one in a banquet room. and we just decided that for all the other things mp offers, that we would have to give something up and iguess the small resort and more privacy may be what we're giving up. thats ok. lenita (andreslove) is getting married there in a month, so hopefully we'll have some better pics and a better idea of exactly what its like after that!

Quote: Originally Posted by MagsieMexico This is great info, thank you! So nobody has actually seen pictures of the beach ceremony, with an arch or chuppah set up? i talked to carolina and she said they are just starting to offer beach weddings at moon palace and i dont think they've ever done them before but you can now do them. they apparently have ordered stuff for the beach wedding but i dont know what it looks like