Dreams Riviera Cancun - Brides post here (new thread)

[amberm410]

Ok so here is my full review. I will try to rememeber everything.

 

I will start out by saying I really enjoyed DRC and would probably return in a few years but they do have some kinks to work out with service etc.. but overall the resort is awesome, food is the best I have ever had at a all inclusive, and the rooms and grounds of the resort are beautiful. I really did have an awesome wedding there.

 

Check in: ok so this is where the kinks started. We were booked for a perferred club room and apon checking in with two other rooms of my family members in the perferred area check in the concierge there didn't seem to know what she was doing. From the start we had to wait about 30 - 45 minutes in this perferred check in area for them to call are name to check in. Once we started to check in with her I informed her that I was getting married at the resort and was supposed to check in with Ana when arriving. I had to remind her to call her once she was finished checking us in and then she couldn't reach her so she said she would have Ana call us. The concierge didn't seem to care about anything I had said. Anyways, once we went to the room we realized out of the 3 rooms that checked in that we had recieved the worst view on one of the outsides of the resort. A few hours later we ended up getting a call from Ana to arrange our meeting and things were fine. Ana had our room moved within 2 days to a lot better view overlooking the resort.

 

The rooms: While I could see the privacy issue with the bathrooms etc being a problem for some people we really didn't have the issue. I am a very private person and it did not bother me at all. The bathrooms and bedrooms were beautiful. The only issue I had with our room which was a perferred honeymoon suite on a corner was the lighting in the bathroom. My family had all complained of the issue as well. Bring a really good makeup mirror with a really bright light. I brought a makeup mirror but the light on it wasn't bright enough so it didn't help at all. The closet space and drawers were adequate for us. We had two weeks worth of clothes and we are both big clothes people and it was fine.

The pool/lounge chairs/beach: The infinity pool was awesome and the swim up bar was our favorite spot to hang. The drinks are the strongest at that bar. The swing bar on the beach was very fun in the evenings. The beach was very nice and don't see why people would complain about seaweed etc.. its natural.

 

Food: AWESOME!!!!! The french and asian place was our favorite. The french place had always had diff things on the menu and each thing we tried was phenominal! The asian place had great food and their outside patio is really cool. Usually during the mornings and lunches we had the seaside grill out by the pool and they had really good taco's and nacho's and all sorts of stuff. I cannot say more about the food at this place it was delish! I have stayed at two other all inclusive top rated resorts in Cancun area and this by far was the best food.

 

Wedding: It all comes together once you meet with Ana and or Yasmin. You can tell how busy they are. Once we met with her she really took care of everything within an hour. our wedding was at the gazebo and I'm telling you girls this is the place to have it. Surprise its pretty cool being out there in the middle of everything going on. Our wedding was at 3pm and she had me walk up around one of the sides and everyone was watching and cheering when we were done. I thought I would like it to be more private but it is pretty cool. I did not have chairs set up since our was so small (my choice) but I could see if you had more than 15 guests having chairs set up would make it more private and intimate but it is really cool having everyone watching. That night and the next day I had so many women come up to me remembering my wedding and saying how cool it was. We had our dinner in the wine room which is off od the french restaurant and it was perfect for our small 12 people. Only 2 small quirks about the eve... we arrived for our dinner and they had only set up for 10 people so there was a communication issue even though Ana had confirmed with me the 12. Also, they brought my cake out to the gazebo and we wanted it at the dinner in the wine room so I asked her to have it then and she said no problem it would be there waiting for us. After dinner they brought out a half eaten choc square cake for us. we looked at it and laughed and said this isn't our cake because ours was a round milk cake (which by the way is so so good. It was recommended by Ana as the best and it was). Also we had not even cut into our cake so obviously this was someone else cake. LOL They fixed it right away and brought us our milk cake. Our photographer was Juan Navarro which did an outstanding job which I mentioned in my previous posts. This was the best part of my wedding besides being married to the best man on earth.

 

The downside: Really like I said everything was great I just think they have some major communication kinks at this resort compared to the others I stayed at. On the first day we waited and waited around in the lobby area to try to schedule something for the concierge for my mothers birthday. The same clueless gal who checked us in also tried to make a reservation for us at the tapenake tables and totally screwed it up. I just felt like I was always being lied to by her and kept having to follow up with her instead of her getting back with me. At first after about 3 hours we were under the impression we had a reservation with the restaurant for 6:30 or 7 on Thursday but she would confirm the time with us in a few hours. The next day after not hearing from her we followed up and she said we didn't have a res but would get back to us. We never heard from her until 5:30 pm on Thursday. She then confirmed it but at that point snce we still hadn't heard from her we already made plans for everyone to go eat in Playa de Carmen. It just seemed like she really had no cust service skills at all. I could tell it also seemed like she was expecting a tip for setting it up. I kinda felt like they are expecting tips all over the resort but didn't get this feeling at the 2nd resort we went to the following week.

 

Another comm issue was that I had contacted the reort about 2 1/2 weeks prior to our arrival to find out about golf. We were told to e-mailthis certain e-mailt to set up a tee time. Well no one replied at all and my brother also had the same response. I think they just need more concierge people and need a little more training.

 

There was one concierge and I cannot remember his name but he seemed to have his stuff together and was able to get us a timely reservation on the patio at the asian place and was able to set up a birthday celebration, beach dinner and cake on the pool deck for my mother. Everything was wonderful except that we were supposed to get the cake at 8:30 for the birthday on the pool deck and we ended up waiting around till about 9 pm with no drinks or anything. I had to ask about 9pm where the cake was and where the bottles of wine we had bought were. They kept telling me it was coming. They brought out the alcohol very soon but I finally had to tell them to forget the cake becuase it was so so late. We had a 8 and 4 year old falling asleep. They insisted the cake was coming. It was about 10pm before getting the cake.

 

Overall things were good and I hope they get the communication issues worked out soon.

[lilly129]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cathyandchin 100 days to go for the big day in Mexico! My legal day is next Friday... So far it's looking like just 20 of us are going, although I only have confirmation from 10, and that's NOT including FI's parents because they HAVEN'T DONE ANYTHING!! sorry, had to vent a bit! But here's my question: since there are so few people coming now I can stretch my OOT bag budget, but would it be tacky to do paper gift bags? I figure what's inside is more important and some people might be like "ugh, another bag" what's yall's opinion? Yes I said "yall's..." I'm from the South!

I love Y'ALL! I live in Houston so I feel like I'm allowed to use it - but my fiance refuses haha. We're originally from Boston.

I'm doing gable boxes - I had the same thought - the stuff in it is more important than the bag itself. And buy not spending the money on the custom bags, I could spend more on the stuff in it.

[amberm410]

Sorry for al the typo's. I should have read it before posting it. Another thing just for your info. Even though I felt like they were expecting tips all over the resort, I truly feel like these people work their butt off and deserve any extra tip you can give them. I do not think they make very much for what they do and a few bucks here and there really helps them.

 

Happy planning!

[lilly129]

Quote:

Originally Posted by amberm410 Sorry for al the typo's. I should have read it before posting it. Another thing just for your info. Even though I felt like they were expecting tips all over the resort, I truly feel like these people work their butt off and deserve any extra tip you can give them. I do not think they make very much for what they do and a few bucks here and there really helps them. Happy planning!

Thank you so much for your review! After reading trip advisor I've been bracing myself for nightmares at check in...

[noonie]

thanks so much for the review, im getting married next wednesday:)

[cathyandchin]

Thanks for the review!

So would you say that upon arriving at the resort we should check in first with Ana?

 

I'm getting sooo excited!

[FutureMrsRobart]

Quote:

Originally Posted by roxmysockz My thoughts excatly! I like a dress that isnt out for a few months yet so ordered a knock off already so I can see if its any good if not I have plenty of time to find another and/or wait for the one I want to come out!

Well this is it. Like I said once I noticed that most of the designer dresses were 'Made in China' I quickly decided to get the knock off made in the same country for a few hundred dollars instead of paying a few thousand dollars for a dress that carried a certain label but was made in the same place. Especially when we'd decided to do a TTD. The lady is super professional - I love her. She said it takes 20-25 days to make, then 3-5 days to courier so I'm looking at late May-early June. Keep your fingers crossed for me :-s

[FutureMrsRobart]

Quote:

Originally Posted by reaganlane Yea! What favors did u order? Enjoy P90X. Me and my fiance did it a while back for a month and a half and then had to quit because we didn't have the time but we wanna start it up again!

I'm still a year out so I just decided to order a couple of things every month or so. That way I gradually get stuff (and have to pay for it in little bursts LOL). Yesterday the aqua beach glass photo coasters and personalized lip balm came. Yeah the P90 is no joke lol I started it a few weeks back but decided to go back to Day 1 so that we can do it together. I joined started posted on the P90x support thread to - I figure if I other people know when I don't do it - I'm less likely to try and skip ... thats the plan anyway lmao

[FutureMrsRobart]

Quote:

Originally Posted by amberm410 Sorry for al the typo's. I should have read it before posting it. Another thing just for your info. Even though I felt like they were expecting tips all over the resort, I truly feel like these people work their butt off and deserve any extra tip you can give them. I do not think they make very much for what they do and a few bucks here and there really helps them. Happy planning!

Thanks for such a great (and thorough) review. Congrats! Can't wait to see the pics :-)

[beachykeen]

Thanks for the review!! I'm probably gonna go with the milk cake since you said it was the best!