Hello!

Here is my review for Dreams Tulum. Our wedding was October.23 2012, we flew from Edmonton AB on Oct.20 and flew back Oct.27. We had about 30 guests for our wedding most from Alberta and BC. I will try my best to give honest feedback and reviews about everything we experienced with the resort.

First I just want to say thank you so much for the wonderful creators and contributors to this website, it really was a life saver. All of the time and dedication everyone has made for this site is a blessing and while I myself did not post every project I did throughout the wedding process I have every intention of getting what I can on here.  So thank you to all the ladies (and men) !!

So now starts the review. I am going to start with a review on the resort itself and do a separate review for the actual wedding.

Dreams Tulum Resort

Arrival

Fast and efficient!  We had 6 pieces of luggage; they all made it to our room. We were welcomed with champagne which was a nice touch. The only guest who had an issue checking in was our grandma who had paid for an upgraded room but was downgraded because she requested 2 beds at the time of check-in, she wasn’t reimbursed for the upgrade she had paid for but they gave her a credit for the spa. No one else had any issues with checking in.

Rooms

We were upgraded upon checking in to a Premium Junior Suit upon checking in. The room had a fantastic location, it was pretty much less than a 5 minute walk to every restaurant and the beach....it was a ways away from the spa but we didn’t care (We didn’t spend a lot of time at the spa) Our room had a king sized bed, large bathroom and lots of space to fit all our luggage. Our only complaint was the air conditioning; we didn’t seem to have any! And we just assumed that was normal until we went to other guest’s rooms and noticed their rooms were much cooler. This also wasn’t a big deal, I would have used my bridesmaids room to get ready the day of the wedding however only because their room was so much cooler. We had one guest who was moved to a different section of the resort because of the construction they are doing, 4 of our guests did complain that the construction was annoying.  Everyone else was happy with their rooms.

Food

• World Buffet- great service always accommodated for our large group and by the end of the trip even remembered what some of our guests preferred to drink and our names!
• Seaside Grill- By far our favorite restaurant. The food is amazing (specially the steak) we had our rehearsal dinner at this one and it was perfect. While we didn’t make a reservation they had 3 big tables ready for us and the waiters were awesome, they were lots of fun and got every order right.
• Portofino- one of the fancier restaurants on the resort, very beautiful inside and the food was good as well. We ate here once, the appetizers were great and every one said their main course was delicious
• Himitsu- Also good food, I am not a fan of fish however and didn’t finish my main course (Red snapper) The waiters were very organised, they brought each table a platter of each appetizer and managed to keep all the orders right (we were all scattered throughout the main area of the restaurant)
• El Patio- I myself didn’t actually eat at this restaurant however all of our guests who did said it too had great food, great atmosphere and they told us the Mexican soup was amazing
• Bordeux- A bit of a story here. We went to eat here on our fifth night; we got there at about 745 and got a seat about an hour later. One of our guests was competing in the “American Idol Dreams Tulum” competition that night which started at 930. We played it safe and gave up our table because we didn’t want to miss the singing....Our parents did eat here and said the food was delicious and their only complaint was how busy the restaurant was.
• Barefoot grill, Coco cafe- the barefoot grill is located beside the dolphin pool across from the seaside grill they make fresh pizzas which are amazing and well worth the wait (we waited about 45 minutes one day for our pizza...the lineup was looooong) and they also have hotdogs and hamburgers which are pretty basic. Coco cafe and fantastic!!! We went there every single day for lattes and they were always delicious. They have great croissant sandwiches and subs and their apple pies are amazing.
• Gohan- None of our guests ate at this restaurant
• The bars- each bar was good, fast service staff was always friendly. Our favorite bar was the Rendevouz, its located right in the plaza area and we used it as a meeting place nearly every night.

Entertainment

The entertainment crew is absolutely fantastic!! They managed to get nearly all of our guests to play/compete in their nightly routines and we all loved it. They went out of their way to remember our group and even brought one of the younger guys up for a special competition on their Birthday. We still talk about them and tell our friends who weren’t able to come how much fun they were.  They most definitely made a difference in the trip.

The Disco- We went there the second night and the disco was open (desires lounge) then it closed that night for renos. Instead of not having anything, they have a disco on the beach which was awesome!! So much fun, they have the strobe lights, black lights, lounge seating, a bar and the music was a lot of fun. We went there almost every night and always had a good time.

The Beach & Ocean

The beach was great, they have a main swimming area with a trampoline and slide deal. The ocean was a bit mucky in this area because it was used the most. We would walk about 20 years or so away and swim/snorkel and the ocean was so much nicer, clear all the way but with more coral.

Spa

We used our spa credit for a couples massage which was very nice. Our other guests had facials, deep tissue massages, pedicures, hydrotherapy and reflexology and they all said it was amazing.

So that is it for the Resort itself. Here is our wedding review

Communication

As I’m sure you have read before, communication can be lacking. We already knew this so we weren’t very surprised when it would take up to 2 weeks to get a reply from the resort. In the end it didn’t make a difference, the wedding coordinator goes through everything with you when you get there

Wedding Coordinator

We had Landy as our coordinator and she was very efficient. Our meeting took about an hour. She sat down with us and confirmed all the choices we had made, we made our final payment at this time as well. We brought her all the decorations we had (which was a lot) and I told her the general idea of what I wanted. I was honestly nervous about how the final result would turn out but that was unnecessary. She was amazing, she nailed the vision I had in my mind. My dress and my husbands suit was steamed the day of and we had them back by 11 in our room, they also steamed the bridesmaid dresses short notice (that morning) and had theirs back at the same time.  My only critic with Landy would be at the reception. We were waiting for her to tell the DJ the wedding party was ready to be introduced and she was either  busy or had no idea we were waiting for her to do that...the best man ended up running to the DJ to tell him

Chapel- We had our ceremony in the chapel. Its air conditioned and has 2 maybe 3 fans in it. We fit all 30 of our guests in comfortably.  I LOVED the chapel, it was so beautiful. We had a speaker for the music we picked and a mic.

Officiant- We had Kiko as our officiant. His email responses were fast and well organized. I added a blessing of the hands reading and we had our own vows, I also changed the timeline he had created. He didn’t end up following that timeline for it and he actually messed up our vows. I don’t think he could pronounce some of the words and he ended up muttering them to us.....we hadn’t memorized our vows and we just made them up on the spot ha ha. So a strong word of advice, have your vows memorized just in case ;)

Resort photographers- We didn’t use them. We had flown in our own photographers. I our meeting I asked them to be at the rehearsal dinner but they weren’t able to. We gave the picture package that was included in our package to our Best man and bridesmaid. They liked their pictures well enough but I wouldn’t have been happy with them if we had used them for the wedding

Resort videography- In our meeting, we confirmed the videographers would do the getting ready, pre ceremony, ceremony and post ceremony. They didn’t show up for any of it and I didn’t notice. We just happened to be at the cocktail hour when they came and pulled me and my husband aside to tell us there had been a miscommunication with the times and they did not record the ceremony. They offered to record the rest of the day and reception for us in place of that and it ended up working out better. I actually didn’t care they had missed the ceremony, and I was much happier we got the reception captured on film instead.

DJ- We hired DJ Doremixx. The crew that came was a lot of fun, we changed the timeline for them a couple times throughout the night and they didn’t mind. They played great music. We had wanted to extend the reception time till 1030 however the price the resort quoted us was nuts (nearly $1000 more) Communication was by far the slowest and most difficult but in the end they were setup well before the reception time and they were so much fun, well worth it!

Florist- We hired Julieta for extra flowers. She created our centerpieces, my bouquet, my MOH bouquet and 2 boutonnieres for the boys.  I loved the center pieces; she included vases with really pretty shells and jewels. The boutonnieres were nice as well except she forgot pins. My bouquet and the MOH bouquet were the exact same, MOH bouquet was smaller. I had sent her a couple different pictures of what I wanted and I wasn’t completely happy with the ones she made. They were too old fashioned for my taste and they did fall apart easy. I do not think it was her fault though, I think it was just miscommunication on my part. However they looked beautiful in pictures. The price difference between her and the resort for the centerpieces was much cheaper.

Resort florist- I used the bouquet in our package for my bridesmaid and the bouquet was beautiful. I did like it more than Julietas bouquets and I used it for quite a few pictures and for the bouquet toss. We had one centerpiece in the package and it was very nice. We also had 2 corsages and 2 bouts which were also nice. I did prefer Julietas bouts.  In hindsight, I would have used the resort florists for everything but the centerpieces (hers were so much better) simply for convenience sake.

Here the timeline we had for our wedding

1045- Hair and makeup. We had Norma Zurama PF Mac come to our makeup and she brought a hairdresser. I cannot stress how much they ROCKED! They showed up early, waited for us in the lobby and had myself, my bridesmaid and my MOH done by 130. She is absolutely amazing and so was the hairstylist. I am writing a separate review for them.

11- Dresses arrived

130-Hair & Makeup finished

2:00 Began walking to the chapel, Ceremony in the chapel

2:45 Ceremony finished

2:45-6:00 Pictures!

6:00-9:00 Reception

9:00 till midnight “ish”  Party continued with the disco on the beach

There were a few hiccups throughout the day, and I didn’t really notice them until the day or so after the wedding. It didn’t have much of an impact at the time and all in all I felt our wedding was perfect.  We couldn’t have had a better day and anything I would have changed in hindsight is truly my type A micro managing side taking over.

I included the what pictures we have with my review but if you would like to see more contact me and I will gladly send some. Also feel free to message me with any questions!

I hope this information helps!

The resorts bouquet and in front of the chapel with the doors closed