Updated Grand Cayman Weddings Thread

[agm04]

Originally Posted by yogi1212 

 

Thanks so much. I am early in the process my date is April 2014 and i just sent save the dates. I want everyone to be together and mingle so now I won't give any options. I'll try and get some units blocked at a condo and tell people to choose who they want to stay with. I know some will do their own thing but at least everyone won't be scattered everywhere.

I think that's a great plan.  Our guest list was such that people organizing themselves would mean no one staying in the condos other than family, so it wouldn't have worked for us, but if it does for you then awesome!

[yogi1212]

this may be switching gears a bit but lets say I go the hotel route for the ceremony and my guests. Will I still need to hire a planner or would their planners be sufficient (i'm planning on the reception at Pappagallos)?

[JJ77]

Originally Posted by yogi1212 

 

this may be switching gears a bit but lets say I go the hotel route for the ceremony and my guests. Will I still need to hire a planner or would their planners be sufficient (i'm planning on the reception at Pappagallos)?

 

 

I think the hotel wedding planner would only assist you if your wedding is at their location and venue.

 

If you want to have it at Pappagallos you would need to hire your own planner.

[BuzzKia]

My husband and I just got married in Grand Cayman on May 1st! We had the ceremony and reception at the Grand Old House, we were torn between having it on the beach for great pictures or at the GOH were it's more private, privacy won out. We still got great pictures on the dock and some unique ones on the rocks. Desiree the planner there is great, she always got back to me quickly and had great suggestions. Some of the prices for the vendors she hires seem pretty steep but I read that you can get a better price if you hire them independently. The bouquet prices were outrageous, so I ordered in flowers from Kirks market and made 3 calla Lilly bouquets myself plus 8 boutonnieres for about $150 US. The food was great and the service during the meal was exceptional. We also had rounds of the Cayman Lemonade served throughout the day and everyone loved it! We got to choose which banquet menu our guests ordered from, but they really liked that they got to chose what they wanted to eat that day and not months in advance like most weddings. We also had the option of swapping out the desert included for wedding cake for a $200 fee which was good, but I was a little bit disappointed with the cake. It looked nothing like the pictures I sent them and it was all fake except one little piece for us to cut. I asked if I could keep the top since it was fake and was told no because they had another wedding the next day. So if you're picky about your cake and don't want a generic one they use for everybody, I would order it elsewhere. They did serve pieces of the coconut rum cake that we chose to everyone and it was devine. I used Spa Esprit for my hair and makeup as well as hair for my 2 bridesmaids and my mother. I loved them and would absolutely recommend going there! Just keep in mind that anywhere you go, the price wont be anywhere near the (starts at) price on their websites. Our photographer was David Wolfe, he seemed like a great guy and would do anything for a good shot (including climbing on a roof). We should have gotten our pictures before we left the Island but he got busy and wasn't able to meet us. He has mailed the DVD to us and we should be receiving it this week, which is not bad compared to some of the long wait times I have heard of from other brides. Fingers crossed they are good We wanted to go the route of renting a few condos close together and having people stay in groups but our guests were not unlike anyone else's and RSVP'd at the last minute. So a group of us stayed at #46 Cayman Reef resort on seven mile beach.. It was Amazing!! You can find it on flipkey.com. The rest of the guests stayed at the Morrits Tortuga club on the east end because of some special pricing we were able to get. I Do Not Recommend staying there. They are the ONLY place on the island where we consistently had bad service. It was mostly from the front desk staff, they were very condescending, SO slow, and lied about things they knew nothing about (example: saying that buying a sim card with a data plan for our unlocked phones would not work, when we said we would do that instead of paying their ridiculous internet prices. Which worked perfectly fine btw and was quite inexpensive with Digicel). Also, the beach there is full of seaweed, that they rarely clean so it smells awful, most of the rooms had ants or termites, none of the screens on the balconies worked without falling off, etc, etc, etc...). Anyway on to the better things... We really wanted our guests to have a great vacation so we planned a few excursions. Firstly we swam with the dolphins at Dolphin Discovery for half price! Courtesy of wildbanana.ky check it out, they have great deals!! We also went on the bio-bay kayak tour with caymankayaks.com and did a Turtle Farm/Sting Ray city/snorkel tour with tourscayman.net I have gone on 3 tours with them now, they are awesome and prices can't be beat! Overall everyone had a great time and were sad to leave. Which will be the same for you and your guests no matter what choices you make for your wedding. I hope this maybe helps someone, let me know if you have any questions I'll be happy to answer.

[agm04]

Originally Posted by yogi1212 

 

this may be switching gears a bit but lets say I go the hotel route for the ceremony and my guests. Will I still need to hire a planner or would their planners be sufficient (i'm planning on the reception at Pappagallos)?

I was really on the fence about using a planner, and it has turned out to be the best money I've spent on this entire thing.  I think a lot of the hotel planners are pretty slow to respond to you (unless it's a couple of weeks before your wedding), and as someone else said, if you're having the reception offsite they wouldn't help with that.  I'm working with Juliette from Five Star Events and I'd recommend her a thousand times over.

[agm04]

Originally Posted by BuzzKia 

 

My husband and I just got married in Grand Cayman on May 1st!

 

We had the ceremony and reception at the Grand Old House, we were torn between having it on the beach for great pictures or at the GOH were it's more private, privacy won out. We still got great pictures on the dock and some unique ones on the rocks. Desiree the planner there is great, she always got back to me quickly and had great suggestions. Some of the prices for the vendors she hires seem pretty steep but I read that you can get a better price if you hire them independently. The bouquet prices were outrageous, so I ordered in flowers from Kirks market and made 3 calla Lilly bouquets myself plus 8 boutonnieres for about $150 US.

 

The food was great and the service during the meal was exceptional. We also had rounds of the Cayman Lemonade served throughout the day and everyone loved it! We got to choose which banquet menu our guests ordered from, but they really liked that they got to chose what they wanted to eat that day and not months in advance like most weddings. We also had the option of swapping out the desert included for wedding cake for a $200 fee which was good, but I was a little bit disappointed with the cake. It looked nothing like the pictures I sent them and it was all fake except one little piece for us to cut. I asked if I could keep the top since it was fake and was told no because they had another wedding the next day. So if you're picky about your cake and don't want a generic one they use for everybody, I would order it elsewhere. They did serve pieces of the coconut rum cake that we chose to everyone and it was devine.

 

I used Spa Esprit for my hair and makeup as well as hair for my 2 bridesmaids and my mother. I loved them and would absolutely recommend going there! Just keep in mind that anywhere you go, the price wont be anywhere near the (starts at) price on their websites.

 

Our photographer was David Wolfe, he seemed like a great guy and would do anything for a good shot (including climbing on a roof). We should have gotten our pictures before we left the Island but he got busy and wasn't able to meet us. He has mailed the DVD to us and we should be receiving it this week, which is not bad compared to some of the long wait times I have heard of from other brides. Fingers crossed they are good

 

We wanted to go the route of renting a few condos close together and having people stay in groups but our guests were not unlike anyone else's and RSVP'd at the last minute. So a group of us stayed at #46 Cayman Reef resort on seven mile beach.. It was Amazing!! You can find it on flipkey.com. The rest of the guests stayed at the Morrits Tortuga club on the east end because of some special pricing we were able to get. I Do Not Recommend staying there. They are the ONLY place on the island where we consistently had bad service. It was mostly from the front desk staff, they were very condescending, SO slow, and lied about things they knew nothing about (example: saying that buying a sim card with a data plan for our unlocked phones would not work, when we said we would do that instead of paying their ridiculous internet prices. Which worked perfectly fine btw and was quite inexpensive with Digicel). Also, the beach there is full of seaweed, that they rarely clean so it smells awful, most of the rooms had ants or termites, none of the screens on the balconies worked without falling off, etc, etc, etc...).

 

Anyway on to the better things... We really wanted our guests to have a great vacation so we planned a few excursions. Firstly we swam with the dolphins at Dolphin Discovery for half price! Courtesy of wildbanana.ky check it out, they have great deals!!

We also went on the bio-bay kayak tour with caymankayaks.com

and did a Turtle Farm/Sting Ray city/snorkel tour with tourscayman.net

I have gone on 3 tours with them now, they are awesome and prices can't be beat!

 

Overall everyone had a great time and were sad to leave. Which will be the same for you and your guests no matter what choices you make for your wedding.

 

I hope this maybe helps someone, let me know if you have any questions I'll be happy to answer.

Congrats!  Sounds like a wonderful wedding!

[sydney2121]

Buzzkia thanks so much for sharing all of your insight. I am heading there in October for my wedding and just starting to work out the details of the decorations/flowers. I am also planning to set up excursions for our guests. Is the flower place you mentioned on the island? When you were setting up the excursions did they give you a deal because you had a wedding party or did you have to negotiate? Looking forward to hearing from you and if you can share a few pics of the wedding that would be great!

[BuzzKia]

Hi sydney2121, Congratulations! Yes, the place I got my flowers is on island. It's a supermarket on Eastern Ave. They don't have a big selection in store, but they can order in flowers for you. Here is their website http://kirkmarket.ky/, you can email the flower manager from there and he is pretty good at responding. I hear the best place to go for flowers on the island is Every Bloom'n thing, but they are more expensive. Cayman Kayaks gives a group discount for 10 or more people. We didn't negotiate for a cheaper price with Tours Cayman because their prices are already so reasonable. They acctually suggested we rent the whole boat because our group was so big. That was $15US more per person. I told them we were fine with other people being in our group to keep costs down and they were fine with that. Some of our pictures are on the Grand Old House website. http://grandoldhouse.blogspot.ca/2013/05/robin-and-brian-married-at-grand-old_23.html?m=1 Let me know if there's anything else I can help with.

[agm04]

I am leaving in 6 days and my head is spinning! Starting to get nervous about the possibility of rain too.

[kkemper]

So we have settled on most of the details for our January 2014 wedding. We are working with Molly and Carol from Creativent. They have been so attentive and helpful with everything and always return my emails so quickly! We are coming in on a cruise ship and therefore it was important for us to have everything timed out perfectly. We have a contract with creativent for cake, photography, decorations, officiant, transportation, etc. The only thing we do not have set is the location. I really need help trying to figure this out! We are on a tight budget and are looking into having it on a public beach so the actual ceremony would be free. Does anyone have any recommendations? I have heard governors beach or smiths cove possibly. Any help would be greatly appreciated!!