Hola :)

Rowdy and I got married at the Royal on July 22, 2011!

Travel Agent: We booked our flights, transportation and accommodations through an outside travel agent - Nanda with Beach Bum Vacation.  So WONDERFUL!  All of our guests used her services as well and had nothing but good things to say about her and her services.  She was constantly providing up to date information and making sure everyone had everything they needed before they left.  We had guests coming from Texas, Minnesota and Arizona.

Flight & Check In: We flew out of Houston on Tuesday, July 19th on Continental Airlines.  There were four other brides who were on the same flight, so unfortunately I was not able to hang my dress, but that didn't really bother me.  My parents came on the same flight as us since they have never traveled to Mexico.  They needed our guidance. :)  The flight went smoothly.

My hubby got the red light in Immigration but luckily he was carrying only our bags with our clothes in them and I was pushing the cart with all the wedding stuff so we didn’t have to go through all of that! The lines are long though and we were in the airport for probably an hour and a half getting through all the lines.

When we got outside of the airport it was easy to find our transportation and we got on the van to head to Playa Del Carmen.

When we arrived at the hotel the hubby and I were whisked off to a private desk away from the front lobby.  My parents were pulled in a separate direction also so we agreed to met at Spice in half an hour.  Our check in went smooth; we were told about the restaurants, given wrist bracelets and offered cold drinks.  We were able to check into our room right away and that was nice.  We were treated like VIP once they knew we were a bride and groom getting married there. :)

View from our ocean view room -

Restaurants:

Spice - We only ate here on the first day for lunch.  It was okay.  There was no air conditioning so this may have affected our experience.  They had fish, chicken, beef, pasta, a salad bar, desserts.

El Mediterraneo - We ate here for lunch one day and for breakfast one day.  I really liked this restaurant and the different options it had. The omelets were especially delicious!

Tapas & Pintxo's - I really liked this one too.  My hubby didn't really care for it, but maybe it was too fancy for him. ;)  We ate here one day during lunch and were able to go in in our swimsuits and cover-ups.  We ordered four items and split them.  I think I remember having calamari (it's not breaded, so don't order if you can't handle that!), two kinds of chicken and beef.

Pelicanos - I didn't eat here, but my hubby did one day with his family.  He said during lunch they have really yummy pizza and fries.

Maria Marie - Our whole group ate here the last night of the trip.  My family was making a big deal about us sitting together and I was trying to tell them to not worry about it; there was no reason to sit together - you are not able to talk to the other person waaaay at the end of the table anyway!  Well, the manager was really accommodating and got us all in the same section at large tables next to each other.  Very, very nice of him. :)  The food was not the Mexican/French I expected, but nonetheless it was very good.  I had a Caesar salad, chicken stuffed with prawns of some kind of chocolate dessert. Yum!

24 hour bar - This was great for those who wanted a beer or wine after the Tequilaria closed and also provided munchies.

Room Service - We loved having room service available 24 hrs./day.  We called them a couple of times for breakfast and late at night when we needed that 4th meal! haha  They were extremely quick and polite.  Once thing we noticed though is that even when we had the do not disturb sign up they would call the room and ask to come in instead of placing it in the Magic Box.  Not sure what the deal was with that.

Asiana- My favorite place!  We went for dinner one night on our own to check it out since we were having our welcome/rehearsal dinner there.  This night we ordered sushi and it was pretty good, but very small portions (compared to Texas sized sushi!), but we loved the atmosphere and service.

The night of the welcome/rehearsal dinner we had salad with rice paper, mixed teriyaki (beef, chicken and shrimp) and tempura ice cream. OUTSTANDING service this night and the drinks were flowing! Here are some of the food pics and a pic me and the hubby.

The most important part - The WEDDING!:

Coordinator - Our online coordinator was Maritza.  Our on-site coordinator was Michel.  I had the usual stressful moments leading up to the arrival at the Royal and during all the conversations, but once we met with Michel on-site I felt so much better.  She had EVERYTHING outlined that we had selected.  We went through all the details line by line and everything was perfectly in order.  She only had to ask us a few questions, such as which chairs  we wanted (they gave us two options) and if we wanted the aisle runner or not.  She also let us choose between 3 hot and 3 cold appetizers for the cocktail hour.  They are very organized and take their job seriously. They are also constantly meeting with brides so I can see how they are busy.  We were so happy leaving her office.  They are so sweet. :)

We choose the Luxury Package.

Romantic dinner on the beach - We did this on our first night.  Plan for a LONG dinner!  I think we were at our table for three hours!!!  For the first 30-45 minutes we didn't receive anything but a ton of drinks so we were already feeling the drinks by the time the salads came! LOL I had chicken and hubby had steak.  I am not a big steak person, but I think I had three bites of his steak and it was the best I have ever had!  Cooked perfectly.

Couples massages - We absolutely loved this.  We had the massages inside the spa.  They heat up your robes, they are very professional and we left feeling extremely relaxed.  A must-do in my opinion.

Hair & Make-up - The spa did my hair and make-up on the day of the wedding and I think they did a wonderful job!  At first there was a bit too much eyeliner on the bottom part of my eyes, but I told her and she wiped it off and I was okay.  I debated doing my make-up so I looked like myself, but I'm so glad I had it done.  The foundation lasted all night.  I had eyelash extensions put on in Houston before we left for the wedding so I didn't need much mascara and I loved how the lashes lasted despite swimming and sweating.  I ended up getting a manicure & pedicure at home before the trip so I didn't use the spas services for the mani/pedi.

Men's Face Saver - My hubby had this the day of the wedding.  He said he was terrified the whole time of the knife so close to his face, but in the end he was happy with the outcome and said he was glad he did it.  His face was SO soft!

Pressing of the dress and grooms suit - This was something I was a bit frustrated with.  We gave the staff our clothes the day after we got there (Wednesday) so that it would be returned Thursday (the day before the wedding).  They did a wonderful job, BUT the day we were supposed to receive the items in our room they said we needed to be there to sign for them.  Well, I called Michel and asked when the items would arrive.  She said within the hour, so I didn't think that was bad.  Then an hour and a half went by and still no dress.  Then the power went out at the whole hotel. Not a big deal; I just hung out on the balcony and it was cool enough…for a bit and then it got old!  I wanted to be out at the pool visiting with family and friends, not just sitting in the room.  My hubby went to deliver some OOT bags to our guests during this time.  When he got back to the room I went down to the wedding center and asked if it was still on the way.  Michel got on her walkie talkie (since the phones were down) and talked to someone.  They said it would be there right away.  So, I went back to the room and it ended up showing up within the next 10 minutes.  I was probably waiting around for the clothes for 2.5 to 3 hours total.  I don't think I would have cared if I would have planned for it and ate breakfast in the room or something, but I didn't plan for it and just wanted to get out of the room!  Don’t send your stuff to get pressed the day before the wedding if you don’t want the added stress on the day of your wedding!  In the end though, the clothes looked wonderful after being pressed.

Flowers - We ordered the bouquet from the resort and I planned on throwing this bouquet at the reception.  I ordered the ceremony bouquet, five bridesmaid bouquets and all of the wrist corsages and boutonnieres for the guys and parents from Marvin with Maya Diseno Floral.  This is the one part of the wedding I didn't think I would have any issues with because I had read such great reviews.  The flowers arrived right on time.  My Mom and my Aunt picked up the flowers while I was getting my hair done, so I didn't see them until I got back to my room.  Well....I ordered calla lilies in yellow.  The flowers were more orange than yellow.  I chose not to get upset about it because at this point I was so excited and nervous at the same time about the wedding and didn't want to let something small get me upset, plus what could I even do about it?  Nothing.  BUT I did not understand why they would not tell me they could not provide the flowers in yellow ahead of time...I'm guessing they weren't in season.  All of the pictures and emails I exchanged with Marvin showed very bright yellow flowers, just as I wanted.  I ended up using the bouquet from the Royal that was included in my package for the ceremony (very beautiful bright yellow flowers!) and threw the other bouquet at the reception to the single ladies.  You can tell in some of the pics the bouts. don't match the bouquet.  Eh...whatevs!  Just a small hiccup in the end. The centerpieces that Marvin provided were the exact yellow that I wanted. They must have been a different type of lilies.  Here are some pics:

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Ceremony - The ceremony went so fast! I can't wait to receive the video so I can remember it better.  Hubby met with the minister beforehand and made sure she knew how to pronounce our names.  She was very nice and used a microphone during the ceremony.  We had a sand ceremony and I was so nervous my hands were shaking while I was pouring the sand!  We didn’t have the aisle runner, any flower petals on the ground, chair sashes, very simple.  That’s how I wanted it and I wouldn’t change a thing. I only wanted to focus on my soon to be hubby and our vows!  Once they announced us as bride and groom and we walked back down the aisle I was so happy and (finally) relaxed!  They had champagne waiting for us at the end of the aisle and we toasted with everyone.

We took a big group picture and then the wedding party went to the beach for photographs.  The rest of the wedding guests went to the cocktail hour.  We didn’t get to see any of the cocktail hour or hear the mariachi band so I can’t really comment on that part.  Our guests did tell us they were requesting songs from the Mariachis and they were having a good time with them.

Reception - We had our reception in the ballroom from 6:30-10:30pm.  We had an ABSOLUTE blast!!!  We had four tables of 8 people each and the hubby and I had our own table at the front of the room.  We didn’t have any chair sashes, we just had small centerpieces (yellow flowers with four small candles around the vase), and our table had a large arrangement of flowers (the same one from the ceremony).  We showed a slide show (they use a projector and project it on a wall) during the four course dinner.  The dinner took about an hour.

For dinner we had: spring salad with goat cheese & almond oil; countryside soup with mushroom, carrots & spinach; beef fillet, salmon fillet or vegetarian entree depending on our guests choice and cheesecake with chocolate. We had three vegetarian meals and had no issues with these. I had place cards with different colored starfish for the entrees so the servers could see what everyone had.

Most people didn’t care for the salad, but the rest of the food was delicious. I LOVED the salmon!  For some the steak was a little rare; probably because there are so many people, but they will cook it more if you ask.  For the cake we had the vanilla flavor. YUM!!! It’s true, you don’t need extra cake; it’s much bigger than it looks.

We used Doremixx for the DJ services and had the light up dance floor.  We didn’t have Ivan, but the DJ we had was great.  I think it was Tome.  He used our small play list mixed with other songs and took requests left and right from our guests.  We paid for the extra hour before we even got to the resort and it is WORTH IT!  We didn’t want the party to stop!  They brought out all the props - balloons, masks, smoke machine, glow stick necklaces, everything!  If you have a group of guests that like to dance and enjoy music I definitely recommend having the DJ and light up dance floor.  After the reception we hung out by the Tequilaria a bit, but we were ready to take off our shoes, relax and call it a night!  I think a few people may have gone out the 5th Avenue.

Photographer - Some of the pics of the ceremony above are from the hotel photographer that was included in the Luxury package.  We are glad we let them take pics of the ceremony because we were able to pick out 24 pics from a total of approx. 40 something pictures they day after our wedding and take them home with us.  They did a great job.

We booked Gonzalo Nunez from Cancun as our professional photographer. He had the best package prices for us. He came for 10 hours on the day of the wedding and then we spent about 5-6 hours with him on the following Sunday for our TTD session. Gonzalo was wonderful and I highly recommend him! It will take 30-60 days from the wedding so once I receive those I’ll have more pics to share. He is very kind and also very upbeat; we loved working with him. He even dropped us off at our honeymoon resort after our TTD session. It was late and dark and we were so tired!

That’s all for now! I feel like this is the longest review ever! I recommend the Royal to anyone who is considering a wedding in Playa Del Carmen. It is wonderful. Our guests kept thanking us for such a great time and were glad to have a vacation at the Royal.

BEST OF LUCK to all of the future brides! :)