Help! Need to decide on a PV Marina Hotel for my wedding!

[moschmro]

My FI and I want to get married in PV on the beach by the Marina because that is where we met. We are looking at 50-60 guests. We are looking at the Marriott, the Westin and the Velas Vallarta. My friends are in grad school still and I don't want to ask them to spend a lot of money. But most of them are in my bridal party and I want them there for the bachelorette party and to spend time with them (more than like 3 days). So it has to be affordable. But also affordable for us as we have to pay for my family (4 ppl) too. I'd like to stay within $20k including travel, hotel, ceremony, reception, dress, invitations, everything!!! Marriott offered an all inclusive rate and a standard rate which I liked the variety of options. But do you think having two options will split the group into those who will eat on site with AL and those who don't? Also the pricing for the ceremony and reception is ridiculous. It looks like It will cost us over $15,000 just for our 50 guests. Has anyone done a wedding at the Marriott and found the pricing to be different?? This and the Westin is about $700 for flight and 5 nights for standard rooms which isn't bad!! The Westin looks nice and is looking into all inclusive rates too. They have a little bit of a cheaper wedding package, maybe $11,000. And the WC is great. But I still feel like its a lot to spend on a ceremony/reception. The Vellas Vallarta is more expensive for my guests but AL. I believe it'd be around $1300 for flight and 5 nights. It would save us a lot of money for the ceremony/ reception. But the price might scare some away. The ceremony/reception would only cost us about $4000. I really want my guests to stay in the same hotel. We're paying for my family so we want them at an AL. But then I don't want my grad school friends in a different hotel because they can't afford it. Ugh I need help deciding please!!'

[leahjuly]

I don't have much experience with Puerto Vallarta but I would NOT recommend Velas Vallarta. My wedding is at the end of the month and we have a block of rooms at Velas for our guests. Ive had a horrible time communicating with the events coordinator. She takes weeks to reply to emails and she'll answer one of the many questions I had asked her.

 

Their prices for events at the hotel are extraordinarily high. My MIL wants to have a welcome reception at the hotel the evening before the wedding and they want to charge us $25 for just beer, wine, and "mexican appetizers" which will basically be chips and guacamole. And that price is only for guests staying at the resort, they'll charge more for any guests not staying at the property. This is why we chose to hold the wedding elsewhere.

 

They also only offer all inclusive rooms and I found the food to be totally marginal so I think its a waste. I would much rather walk 10 minutes down to the marina to eat. Everywhere we ate there was far better than the hotel and you can get almost anything from super cheap mexican food all the way to pretty fancy Italian. 

 

The only reason we have our room block at Velas is because my fiancé's family are condo owners there and have been for decades so I was obligated. Having said that, I was able to visit the resort a few months ago and it was wonderful. It is the most beautiful resort on that strip of beach and the staff that you interact with is really great. 

 

We also have quite a few friends in grad school and thankfully they were clever enough to check out airbnb where condo owners at Velas rent out their rooms at a cheaper price than the hotel rates. They wont be all inclusive with this route but they were able to get a pretty big place and split it so that it was pretty affordable for them. 

[acw271011]

Congrats and welcome to the BDW site! You'll find tons of information and tips and ideas here that I'm sure will help you with your destination wedding planning.

 

There is a section on resort and vendor reviews, so I would recommend keying in the resorts you're considering into the search bar to see if something comes up that will hep you with your decision. I don't have any experience with PV but definitely get in touch with the owners of this website! They are professionals and very experienced with destination weddings and I'm sure they would be able to help you out with the info that you want to be able to make a decision. As well, they just may be able to help you out with your rates!

 

Good luck and happy planning!