Soon2BePowers Wedding Review of Valentin Riviera Maya

[soon2bePowers]

Valentin Riviera Maya Review

Our Stay: June 8-17
Most guests stay: June 9-13


Applevacations (:
Direct flight to Mexico, on time and perfect. Flights were pretty full. We did have to have $25 b/c on of our bags was over weight. Transfer from airport to resort was pretty good. We had to wait a few minutes, we were the only ones of the flight going to Valentin so they grouped us with 3 other couples. We were the 3 stop.

Direct flight home was a bit delayed but not a big deal. The transfer from the resort to the airport was a HUGE bus. Thank god we were one of the last pickups I imagine the first pickups had been on the bus for a long time!

Resort/Check-in (A)
We were met with a cold towel and champagne and then head straight in to check in. Our room was ready but the couple's who came with us was not. They have complimentary rooms for people to change in if you need it. On Tuesday when 25 of our guests arrived all of their rooms were ready. The take you on a quick cart tour of the resort and then to your room.

Rooms (A)
The rooms was wonderful!! Lots of variety in room and view. All of the rooms are nice just some nicer. The views are all wonderful but may be of various things, garden, pool, beach!


We got different towel animals each day!


View from our room!

Food/drink (A++)
For breakfast each day their was an amazing buffet. Tons of delicous food with lots of variety. They also had a place with continental breakfast (never went here).

For lunch they had 2 buffets and 1 menu restaurant. We visited all and they were all great.

For dinner they have a steak, lobster pot, Mexican, Japanese, French, Indonesian, and Italian. We made it to all the restaurants except for the Italian. They were all AMAZING! I can't say enough about the resorts food. About every other night they also had themed buffet dinners, these were great too.

Drinks flowed and were great! I have noticed at some AI you can drink and drink and drink and never feel a thing. Not true here, the drinks were great and they had a great variety of good liquor.

Resort Grounds (A)
Lots of iguanas! The grounds were beautiful and were very well kept. There were always people grooming and landscaping. The resort is beautiful! The resort is big and take a bit to get used to. There are places at night that can be some what dark.


View from outside the breakfast/lunch restaurant


Part of the main pool and one of the swim up bars

Wedding Coordinators (F to a
Since beginning to plan I have worked with 5 wedding planners, YIKES! Currently Lupita (not great) and Adeiana (was great) (we called her Arey) are working together. The communication prior to arrival was an F. They were hard to get a hold of and things weren't smooth. We arrived Monday morning and met with Arey that afternoon. With that first visit we went over everything and I felt much more at ease. FI, my mom and step-dad all came to the meeting. My mom took notes and actually met with Lupita and Arey the next day to go over everything we had decided on.

We brought chair bows, ipod, seat fans, sand ceremony, guestbook with sign, Shoes optional sign, starfish for tables and I think thats it. Arey took all of these and made sure they were in the right place for our big day!

*funny side note* After the dinner my aunt said we took a couple of the starfish that were on the table for your cousins. She thought they were the resorts, I laughed and said thanks for stealing from Dave and I!!

[soon2bePowers]

Ceremony (A)

We had our 5:00 ceremony on the beach. It was very private as it was away from the swimming and laying out areas. It was very windy and I battled with my veil some. It made FI and I laugh, so it was all good.

 

We had the white chair covers and they put our bows on them and placed our fans on the seats. Up front there was a table with a white cover for our sand ceremony. We brought flowers but the package included a boutique so we placed it on the table.

 

The resort provided Marco, to handle our music. This was a surprise as we had brought an Bose system for our music. He also had a microphone for the minister and for us to use to say our vows.

 

After the ceremony we had a champagne toast on the beach and then did group photos.

 

 

 

Minister (A)

Kiko Flores was our minister. He was great, FI met him just prior to the ceremony. He was very nice and did a wonderful job.

 

Cocktail Hour (?)

I heard this was really nice but we never made it. It had Mexican appetizers and cocktails. Everyone said it was good, we had it in the gazebo.

 

Dinner (A+)

We held our reception dinner on the terrace outside the Mexican restaurant. It was perfect and very private. Our menu was Caesar salad, Asparugus soap (YUMMY), Steak/Shrimp, with potatoes. It was amazing!!

 

We got so into pics, we were late for dinner..oops!

 

Cake (A)

The cake was perfect and beautiful. The cake had 3 tiers, the bottom one was fake (shhh). That was Arey's idea so that the cake would look bigger. Our dinner menu include cake also so guest were severed both. It worked because one was vanilla and one was chocolate.

 

I LOVED THE CAKE!!

 

Other notes:

Every night there is some type of entertainment. The night of our wedding the entertainment was FIRE DANCERS!! It worked out great, after dinner we all head over to see the show. It was perfect!

 

Surprises from the Valentin:

We were not planning on have the Valentin do the music/sound because it was so expensive. When we met with Arey on Monday she acted like it was included! YEAH!

 

We also were told chair covers were extra but they were not! YEAH!

 

Arey threw in centerpiece as a gift to us (Lupita was not happy about this)! YEAH!

[soon2bePowers]

Claudia Rodriguez-photographer

We don't have our pics yet but Claudia and her assistant were wonderful to work with. She showed up a few minutes early and stayed until we were finished. Probably 20-30 longer than our package.

 

The resort photographer was part of our package but we hired Claudia to do our wedding. Since we paid for the resort photographer we had a 1hr. session with him later in the week. I am in a long purple dress in all of his pics. He did a nice job and would probably do great at a wedding but I would still have book Claudia. FI said this guy is good but Claudia was amazing!

 

Resort photog. took this.

 

 

Everyone is still talking about their trip and about how they want to go back. The resort was at very low occupancy when we were there around 300 guest when the resort holds over 1000. Due to the swine flu they also had to lay-off a lot of staff. Due to this some things closed early than we would have liked but hey, it was the US media that did it to them!

 

 

Group shot after the Michael Jackson Show

[jayla]

I'm new but have been following your wedding planning journey carefully as I am most likely going to have mine at the VIM too. Congratulations! I am so glad that in the end everything went well. Even though I'm a lurker you've both inspired me and reassured me through your posts. From what I can see, it looks like your special day was beautiful!

[alkoch]

everything looks so nice! Congrats!

[soon2bePowers]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jayla I'm new but have been following your wedding planning journey carefully as I am most likely going to have mine at the VIM too. Congratulations! I am so glad that in the end everything went well. Even though I'm a lurker you've both inspired me and reassured me through your posts. From what I can see, it looks like your special day was beautiful!

Jayla,
I am glad I have been helpful. I will say the planning process was not smooth with VIM. I got 99% of everything accomplished when I arrived. I am very type A and this was hard for me BUT in the end I would not change a thing. The resort is amazing, food is out of this world and once there details were taken care of.

When I get more pics of the ceremony site I will post them. I would am to work with Araidna if possible. I am planning on sending the general manager an email about how fabulous she was. She is technically Lupita's assistant but I think she should be promoted to head WC.

[t777a]

Wow what a relief. I will definitely be more in contact with adrianna now. It sounds like it was just wonderful i am soo happy for you. and the pics are beautiful!!!

[michellepicksbrent]

Sounds like you had a great time! Congratulations!!

[Carolyn]

Congrats and you look great in your dress.

[tylersgirl]

Congrats girl! You looked gorgeous and your cake was too cute!