ROYAL PLAYA DEL CARMEN BRIDES: were kids allowed for the day? ...and other questions

[acw271011]

I'm headed back to the Royal (6th time - certifiable, I know!!). will anyone be getting married there over Labor Day??

 

I actually spoke to a TA earlier this week - the one all the canadian ladies are recommending actually (laurielee.ca) and she told me that the Royal is going to be changing from being a Real Resort but she was emailing her Rep to try to find out what it's changing to. In the meantime she said she couldn't even get it to come up to book for the fall of this year. Don't know what it means but she said she would email me and let me know what she was able to find out.

 

It's a good sign that you're going back again. That's a good reflection on the treatment by the resort! How do you find the beach there?

[kellygrrrl]

no KIDDING?! the royal in cancun was purchased by hyatt (it's now the hyatt zilara). fortunately, according to the trip advisor reports nothing has really changed. maybe the same is in store for playa. 

 

sad for the change, but it's indicative of all the commercial traffic playa has garnered - I've been going there for the past decade, and it's really different today. but I'm still in love with it and would consider buying a condo there if not for the political uncertainty. 

 

as far as the beach, it all depends on what you're used to. I found it to be better than Hawaii's big island (their beaches are either rocky or man-made). but if it's a beach you want, you cannot beat Tulum. we went to one there through a tour company, and they said it was the one used on Corona commercials! 

 

the playa beach also has a lot of local pedestrians. of course, they're not allowed on the Royal's property, but where the water meets the sand is public domain, so there's no way to control what happens. that's one reason we chose to get married in the gazebo.

 

apologies if much of this has been said already. it's been quite a hiatus for me, but I'm happy to answer any questions! 

[joacevedo15]

For those of you that had your wedding in October, November, December, how was the weather?

[chrystal87]

The Royal-Playa del Carmen

June 18th 2014

We arrived to Playa Sunday and spent one week there. Our wedding was sincerely perfect. Of course we hit some bumps and I hope I can help any upcoming Playa brides. I like being as detailed as I can so this may be long  Alvin and I were engaged 12-21-12 and I reached out to The Royal website mid-January. Our flights were booked in May 2013, court wedding was 6-28-14, invitations out Fall of 2013 and we put the RSVP at 1-31-14

Peach Travels/Pleasant Holiday Travel Agent

PROS- Sheila Peach was a sweetheart and communicated very well. She was found on the Royal website and lives less than ten minutes away from me. She helped inform me with what I needed to do for a smooth wedding planning. I did not deal with her too much since we were booking our flights and room with Pleasant Holiday. Our guest and I dealt with Brianna. She was very easy to communicate with until a month before our wedding. She was out of her office a lot and not responding to us. We were very happy that she found us direct flights from LAX to Cancun for $381. Close to departure we all received a neat booklet to organize our boarding passes, itinerary, and passport. We also received luggage tags and some discount coupons.

 

CONS- Some guests complained that Brianna was not responding to them. I had a hand full of guests contact another coworker or her boss due to the lack of responding back quickly. I personally did not deal with that but some guest did.

There were issued the day we arrived to The Royal and after an hour of arguments, sweat, and walking back and forth we finally received the room we paid for. We received our room 2 days later and had to sign a contract stating we could not complain about The Royal, Peach Travels and Pleasant Holiday. PLEASE be aware that the new wedding packages at The Royal may include an upgrade. You may or may not get it so do not worry too much about the room you stay in. All rooms are beautiful. I also do not recommend the swim up suites. Yes, you feel like a famous artist in a music video with your own pool but you can only be in it until 9 pm. Personally I do not think it is worth the price.

 

Invitations

After lots of research I found beautiful and affordable passport/boarding pass invitations. We originally saw the idea on Pinterest. Here is the website https://weddingpassports.com/passport-gallery/

Vanessa and Dave were so awesome! They sent me the template for The Royal and I went to a local printing company to personalize and print them. I paid $25 for the template and Stella Graphix from Hawthorne, CA charged me $200 for personalizing the template and printing 75 invitations and boarding passes. We LOVE our invitations. We were so excited and noticed we put a wrong contact email so I ordered business cards on Vistaprint for about $8 and added the business cards in the invitations. I also made address labels on Vistaprint with a photo of us from our court house wedding. I also bought the paper and transparent envelopes on ebay.

 

Dress

I was always one to say I was going with a simple silk wedding dress but after trying on dresses at boutiques and David’s Bridal my mind was confused on with what I wanted. I was able to narrow it down to two dresses from David’s Bridal Galina Signature SWG 400 and Beaded Lace Sheath with Godet Inserts Style VW9340. Again, after lots of searching the web I found my size on ebay and bought both. One for the wedding and one for trash the dress. The dresses were very comfortable. I spent $400 for both dresses, used. I also bought my veil on ebay for $120. My veil had lace trim.

 

Jewelry

I am lucky to know a very talented jewelry maker. I met her through my husband. She is a counselor in San Diego but makes amazing jewerly. I bought my bridesmaids and moms necklaces and my maid of honor an awesome cuff. I wore a slave bracelet and statement necklace. http://waterthelove.com/

I also bought a necklace and earrings from ebay for our ceremony. I loved that this necklace had a teardrop falling from my back.

 

Resort

All of our guests loved the resort! The staffs have such huge hearts, so caring and always welcoming us with a big smile and the Mayan welcome. We had 51 guests and about 16 stayed at The Royal and the rest at their sister resort The Gran Porto. We loved how simple the walk was to The Gran Porto. Our rooms were always cleaned quickly and left surprises like candy, candles lit, or cool towel origami animals. We usually ate at Spice and we also recommend the Italian restaurant and Maria’s at The Gran Porto. The Royal had the best beach. Beach was not dirty and it was not congested. If you are facing the beach, you can walk to you left and find watersport things that you can rent for a good price. They also have $35 hour massages on the beach. Much cheaper than the resort’s massages. Ohhh and don’t forget about room services. It is soooo good. The night before our wedding we stayed in my room and after being kicked out of our swim up pool we went into the hot tub and ordered every dessert on the menu. Resort is def an A+. The entertainment is also great! My friends did the water aerobics and we did the zumba one day too. Super fun

 

Wedding

My coordinator was Lorena and she was my favorite person to deal with! Working with her was perfect. She is a very loving person and her calmness helped me out so much. I met with her about three times before the wedding and she was constantly checking in with me during the wedding. While I was getting ready I was able to email her any concerns and she responded quickly. She even came down to the spa to check in with me and ensure I was all good. My entire family was so thankful for Lorena and all the workers. We tipped everyone because we were so so happy. I told the workers mu favorite drink was their electric lemonade and they did such a great time making sure I always has one in front of me. My wedding started at 4:30 and the weather was so perfect. We did have some wedding crashers who were very rude to our best man but Lorena quickly went to help and called for security to stand around our wedding to ensure no other person came to grab champagne the bar set up was also great. We had our table set up so we had the view of the ocean and our family all in front of us. Words cannot express how perfect our beach wedding was. Perfect music by DJ doremixx has us dancing the entire night. We had a wedding of 51 people and the dance floor was a little small but you have the entire beach to dance on 

 

Photographer

I was so fortunate to find Ione Photography!!! Ione was so good and communicating. We exchanged emails throughout the planning process and we even had a pinterest page to exchange what type of photos we had in vision to take. As we got closer to the date we exchanged information for an app called WhatsApp on our phones which made it even quicker for us to communicate. The day of the weddings Ione sent me a text on WhatsApp and let me know he was on his way. At that moment I realized our wedding was getting closer  Ione met me in my room and our second photographer met my husband in his best man’s room. His work was done so calm and captured so many great shots. I didn’t think I wanted photos of me getting ready but I’m so glad he did. He captured funny moments like zipping up my dress ( dress was a bit tight lol ) and my cousin blowing air on my neck as I was sweating . As we walked down to the beach Ione helped take more photos and then departed as it was time to walk down the aisle. My family also fell in love with our photographers. They captured not only precious moments of Alvin and I but also amazing photos of our niece, cousins, family and friends. Alvin and I had moments where we went off and took photos on the beach and I love them! He also did a great job and reminding our excited family that they were creating a shadow in our wedding pictures as they as rushed and gathered around them to snap photos of their own. They took great photos that we will treasure forever. Every photo was so beautiful. Their creativity was so unique and so perfect.

 

The day after the wedding we met again for trash the dress. We went to Cenote Cristalino. I had my makeup done with Cecilia Hernandez which is Ione’s friend. I sincerely wish I would have gone with her to get my makeup done for the wedding, she was fabulous and the makeup lasted ALL DAY. I jumped off a cliff into the water, dunked my head under water multiple times and after the photo shoot still went swimming in the pool with friends and not an eyelash fell or make up smear. I was so happy that Ione referred me to her because her makeup was the best I have ever had. I even emailed her after the wedding to get information on the makeup she used because it was so good. She does have a Facebook and informed me you can search her there or here is her information [email protected] or phone 9848765152. Between her awesome work on my face and Ione’s work with the cameras it was heaven  trash the dress was so much fun and tiring. I never realized all the techniques needed to look pretty underwater. Luckily we has such good support and patience from ione. We didn’t have specific poses which worked out well! Some of our photos you can see and feel the nature happiness we had glowing the day after our beautiful wedding.

 

We received a webpage with all photos. Ione had a small issue with his laptop but communicated that immediately which I highly respect him for his great communication. My package came in so quickly! He added a tablet with an amazing slideshow

Ione photography is so professional and so caring about the type of work he will do for your destination wedding. I recommend him to all Playa del Carmen brides