Hilton Los Cabos Wedding - Lots of Vendor Reviews!

[Cabobride13]

Here is my review of all of my wedding vendors!  

Hilton Los Cabos

AWESOME!!  This resort is one of the best resorts we’ve ever been to.  It’s a big property but not too big that you feel lost.  We love Hawaii and were looking for a hotel that gives you the feeling like you are in Hawaii.  This definitely fit the bill.  There is a great infinity pool, lots of chairs and cabanas (free), 2 swim up bars, and many restaurant choices.  The rooms are well taken care of and I loved the décor.  They upgraded our room to a HUGE suite which was fantastic.  The Hilton sits on a big beach (part is swimmable) and the view from the rooms is just perfect.  I highly recommend it as a hotel to host your wedding.  Go check it out and I guarantee you’ll fall in love.  All of our guests were very happy with the hotel and many are planning to return on their own vacations. 

The hotel is outside of Cabo, so if you plan to get off the property, you’ll need a rental car or pay for cabs ($25 one-way).  Most guests just stayed on the property the entire time.  We rented a car so we could go to the grocery store, restaurants, and take people into town.

Flowers – Arete Florals

Adriana worked her magic and made beautiful centerpieces, bouquets, boutonnieres, and chuppah design.  I loved how the flowers turned out.  I sent her pictures of my ideas and she executed them perfectly and exceeded my expectations.  She worked with my budget and was very professional.  Highly recommend.

DJ – Teevan

Victor De Alba was great to work with.  He has a simple information sheet to fill out with your music picks.  My fiancé and I spent a lot of time selecting music and finished about 1 week prior to the wedding.  Victor was ready to go with our music selections and he put on a great set.  I was worried that no one was going to dance at my wedding, but he had the dance floor packed.  He was very professional and easy to work with.  A+++

Photographer – Enrique Morales

Enrique was great!  The pictures turned out amazing and I couldn’t be happier!  It was hot the night of our wedding and most of the guys were covered in sweat.  Thankfully, he was able to photoshop the sweat away!  He hustled to get as many shots as possible and sent us 3 CDs full of the digital copies.  He also sent a photo album too.  He was accommodating, friendly, and patient with our guests. 

Wedding Coordinators - Juan Carlos Romero & Cristina Vaca

They are angels.  They were fantastic to work with leading up to the wedding and during the wedding.  Juan Carlos stayed until the very end after we lit the wish lanterns.  Bless his heart!  They are professional, organized, and very nice!  They answered all our questions timely and really made us feel welcome and special.  They definitely went the extra mile!

Officiant – Rodrigo Riva Palacio

He was excellent and I was happy with his deliverance.  He added some humor where appropriate and made it personal too.  He made me cry (tears of happiness of course!).  We did the wine box ceremony instead of the sand ceremony, which was new to me and my guests.  It was very cute and meaningful.  Highly recommend. 

Makeup/Hair – Hilton Spa

This was the only hiccup at my wedding. I was told my makeup artist would arrive at 4, but she told the Hilton, she would arrive at 4:30.  I had no idea and thought she was running late.  Needless to say, I was freaking out that she was never going to arrive.  Thankfully she did and she was great.  I barely wear makeup on a day to day basis, so I was a little nervous that I might look overdone.  My nerves were put to rest because she did an awesome job.  I do want to note that the Spa management was excellent during this little hiccup.  The hair stylist was average.  I ended up with a typical wedding updo.  It was ok, just not my favorite.  My bridesmaid was happy with her hair and makeup.

Guitarist - Alonso

Excellent!!  He is very skilled and played beautifully.  Definitely recommend.

Food/Drink – Hilton Los Cabos

We choose the buffet option and were pleased with the food selections. The hotel let us substitute choices from other menus to make a custom menu we were happy with. The food was delicious. We chose a cake from the Hilton and were pleased with it as well. We had a tough time choosing between an open bar or consumption bar and ended up choosing the open bar. The wait staff was excellent during the wedding. They kept your drinks full and were very attentive. Our guests raved about the service. It was very humid and the waiters brought wet washcloths to the groom to keep him cool. He loved it.

Weather: We got married in July, and thus, we were nervous about the heat. The week prior to the wedding, the weather was hot but there was a breeze that made it very nice. However, on the night of the wedding, it was SUPER humid. Everyone was a sweaty mess. You can’t control the weather, but I do wish we would have chosen a date that wasn’t in July. 

Sunset Dinner Cruise – Cabo Mar

FABULOUS!!!!  If you are thinking about doing this, DO IT.  We booked the private dinner cruise the night before our wedding.  We had 37 guests plus 7 kids and there were tons of room for everyone to be very comfortable.  The boat will hold many more.  Our guests were blown away at the ship, staff, food, and overall awesomeness.  It was a highlight for everyone’s trip.  The staff was welcoming, kept your drinks full, and got the dance party started upstairs.  The food was great and they even accommodated some of our guests that had special diets.  The boat was big and clean.  The scenery was A++.  Again, you should definitely do this for your wedding party.

Transportation to Dinner Cruise – Transcabo

We reserved a 50 passenger bus to take our guests to the marina.  The bus was on time, very clean (seemed brand new), and once again our guests were blown away at how cool it was.  I got quotes from other companies and none of them had a 50 passenger bus.  Instead they wanted to split up our group in 16 or 8 passenger vans.  I’m so glad we went with the bus.  It was roughly the same cost as getting multiple vans.

Rental Car - Thrifty

We rented a car from Thrifty at the Cabo airport. Be aware that they require you purchase the liability insurance. You cannot decline it. The collision insurance (covered by your credit card) is not mandatory and you can decline it. If you decline the collision insurance, they put a $3000 hold on your credit card. Make sure you double check your bill when you drop off the car and agree on the pesos that they will charge your credit card. We agreed on a price in dollars (not pesos). They applied the wrong exchange rate to covert the price to pesos and ended up overcharging us. Be careful!

Welcome Bags

We took down our welcome bags during our planning trip two months before our wedding.  The hotel was nice enough to store them until we arrived for the wedding.  It definitely cut down on the stress of packing for the wedding.  The Hilton charges a fee to deliver the bags to the room.  I was surprised by that.  I thought the bags would be waiting in the room when the guests arrived, but sadly they weren’t.  The hotel sporadically delivered them in the afternoon.  Therefore our guests didn’t have the itinerary to see the wedding activities when they initially arrived.  It caused me unneeded stress and we asked the hotel multiple times that we wanted the bags delivered quickly.  I don’t understand why the bags couldn’t be behind the front desk and just handed to the guests upon check-in.  If I could go back, I would hand deliver the bags myself. 

Transporting the dress

I flew Spirit airlines and my parents flew American Airlines. In my research, Spirit didn’t seem wedding dress friendly and made it seem like you’d have to pay for oversized carry on. I asked my parents to hand carry it on American. Luckily, the American Airlines flight attendants were very friendly and let the dress hang in the first class cabin (my parents were in coach). When I got on my Spirit flight, I asked the attendant and she says it would have been no problem to hand carry it on, it happens all the time.

Wish Lanterns

We did this at the end of the reception.  Many of our guests were liquored up by that time, so they didn’t have the patience or coordination to light the lanterns properly.  Therefore, a lot of the wish lanterns caught on fire and burned up in the sand.  For the sober guests, they enjoyed it.  It was a neat thing to do since none of the guests had done them before. 

I'm so happy with my decision to have the wedding at the Hilton.  Our guests are still raving about it and said it was the best wedding ever!