Gran Bahia Principe Akumal/Tulum/Coba - POST HERE!

[kdnolan]

@@sarakelz What type of decorations did you bring? Where did you get your hair and makeup done? Thanks for the great review!

[sarakelz]

@@sarakelz What type of decorations did you bring? Where did you get your hair and makeup done? Thanks for the great review!

 

No problem! Love sharing my experience with everyone.

I had my hair done at the COBA spa. I had a lady by the name of Marisol. She was amazing. I went for trail run the day before the wedding. I showed her 1 pic on my phone of a hairstyle I saw on pinterest. 15 minutes later she had created it perfectly. On the wedding day, she was also super quick... approx 25-30 min and my hair lasted the whole day and night. Didn't even have to add anymore hairspray. I had an updo done and it cost $95 I think but worth it because she was quick and it lasted.

My make-up was done by a friend that came. She always has hers done so nice... so I asked her to do mine. I went and got my own concealer/foundation/powder/lip stain from MAC before we left, and she did the rest for me. We did a trial run a few days prior. My sister brought down some setting spray that she found at Sephora. We all used it the night of dancing at Coco Bongos and everyone's makeup still looked great at 5AM. LOL

 

For the ceremony- we had some raffia fans that we glued some paper flowers onto in our wedding colors. Our guests loved this so they could cool down. We also had paper fans that hung on all the chairs in our wedding color. The resort provided white bows on the chairs. We also made up our own programs for our guests. And we brought down a chalk board that said "pick a seat not a side..." We later used the chalk board in our photos to use as our thank you sign for our thank you cards.

For the dinner- We made our own dinner menus. We had twisty lollipops in our wedding colors that we taped together with colored tape. We made 2 puzzles and had out guests sign them. We took out the middle pieces and turned it into a frame. We had 4 tables of 10 at our wedding, so I had 8 lanterns that we put LED votives in. Then we had these glass starfish in our wedding colors that we put on each table.

For the reception- We just bought a big basket of shells at the dollar store in Canada. they were spread out on the high top tables. I brought down some drink napkins in our wedding colors. The resort decorated the reception area with white paper bags with candles inside. They had some paper lanterns hung from above the area we did the speeches and the music was played.

 

We managed to get everything into 2 suitcases. In my opinion... the resort and the beach itself is the decoration. That is what i kept telling myself so i didn't go overboard. Just a few personal things in your wedding colors is all you need. Everything goes by so quickly that no one even notices those small details.

[MrsMoorsy]

Is anyone else having troubles with the photography studio?? I have told them like 5 times that we don't want to use them but they want all our photographers information and I have told them we wont be providing that information because quite frankly it's none of their business. They meet the 5 night min requirement and that should be enough.

 

I don't want them to tracker her down at the airport because shes here for "work" and then not let her into Mexico.

How did other brides get away with this? my DW planner has told me to say shes a family friend and I've tried that and they still don't accept it.

[TATrisha]

I would just ignore their emails, quite frankly.  They will show up at your meeting with your wedding coordinator at which time you'll tell her AGAIN that you don't need their services.  You'll sign the paper saying that you agreed to not have them there and that should be the end of it.

 

And you're right, I would not give them your photographers information.

[heatherp1927]

Is anyone else having troubles with the photography studio?? I have told them like 5 times that we don't want to use them but they want all our photographers information and I have told them we wont be providing that information because quite frankly it's none of their business. They meet the 5 night min requirement and that should be enough.

 

I don't want them to tracker her down at the airport because shes here for "work" and then not let her into Mexico.

How did other brides get away with this? my DW planner has told me to say shes a family friend and I've tried that and they still don't accept it.

I'm having troubles with the photographer right now too. They are trying to upsell us on the packages way beyond what we can afford. I said I wanted the 3 hr package and all of a sudden they are insisting on 4. 3 is already beyond what we can afford and they will not respond to me now that I said I couldn't afford the 4. Does anyone have an outside photographer coming down around April 7th who would want to split the cost? I don't even no where to start contacting people with only 1 month to go.........

[kdnolan]

@@sarakelz did you have a playlist for the DJ? Did you have it on CD, IPod? For both the ceremony and reception? Your cake was really nice... How much extra? I hate not really having a budget...

[TATrisha]

Sorry for the trouble you're having to go through Heather  

Your date is a little tricky as it appears the weekend before is sold out (just glancing at Expedia, a travel agent could probably get a room).

 

Here are the two brides getting married near your date

sarahlee - 04/04/2014

breena985 - 04/09/2014 - Akumal

 

Looking at my prices (and you'd be able to find other photographers that are similar, I would think)

 

Flying in the 6th and leaving the 11th (fulfilling the 5 night requirement is cheaper by a few dollars than the $400 fee for less than 5 nights), it'd be $2000 for travel and $1000 for all day wedding day coverage.  So you could split that with another bride and then each only pay $2000 total. 

How much is the onsite photographer charging you for the 3 hours?

[MrsMoorsy]

I'm having troubles with the photographer right now too. They are trying to upsell us on the packages way beyond what we can afford. I said I wanted the 3 hr package and all of a sudden they are insisting on 4. 3 is already beyond what we can afford and they will not respond to me now that I said I couldn't afford the 4. Does anyone have an outside photographer coming down around April 7th who would want to split the cost? I don't even no where to start contacting people with only 1 month to go.........

Do you have a travel agent?? try getting them involved, I got ours involved and I'm hoping everything will be ok and they don't show up. 

[nic817]

Hey ladies - we leave in exactly one week for our wedding trip. Getting very excited but also a little anxious - just want to make sure I have everything I need. Any last minute suggestions of what to bring with me aside from the obvious? I printed all the important emails I exchanged with Jazmin and the photo studio (where they said I just had to sign a paper at the meeting saying I didn't want them there). I've emailed both Jazmin and Paloma 3 times over the past two weeks and haven't heard anything back yet. I just wanted to know when our meeting would be when we arrive...should I just assume they will contact me or the front desk will set this up? Seems bizarre that one week away they aren't replying.

[sarakelz]

@@kdnolan

Sorry for the delay! Was out of town.

 

We did up a playlist for the the reception.... it was a little stressful! haha!

We knew we had a 3 hour window... and wanted certain songs to play. We asked our guests ahead of time for requests and we tried really hard to include as many as possible.

 

We started our reception at 8 pm. We did approx 15-20 min of speeches.

Then we did bride/groom dance, followed by father/daughter, then Mother/son.

We did broke down our playlist to take us till approx 9:30, where we then played the shoe game... this took approx 5-7 min. Then we made another playlist to take us to about 10:45... then we did an announcement to introduce the last 3 songs of the night and say good night and thank you to everyone.

 

We bought an app from itunes called "Mix and Mash". It was great because we could fade songs into the next and make name our playlists to make it easy for our MC to navigate.

The reason is was stressful was trying to get the timing perfect so we didn't run over... but also didn't run too short... plus trying to get in all the music we wanted was tough!

 

As for the cake.... no extra charge! I had emailed the WC a picture of what I wanted ahead of time, I told her I would bring the ribbon because it was the exact color I wanted. When I met with the WC, I said 2 tier was fine... so I was amazed when the chef brought out the 3 tier cake.

 

Hope this helps!