Just over a week ago, one of our readers had her Aruba wedding! I got to know her back when I was planning my wedding. She posted a detailed review on the Aruba.com forum which she said she’s glad for me to share here as well. So here goes – the good and the bad:

We just got back Saturday night from Aruba. We had our wedding at the Marriott Stellaris. I can’t say enough good things about the entire process. It really was stress-free. I had gotten a ton of information off of this board  and website [Aruba.com] - another board member Christene also had wonderful information that was so helpful. We worked with Corinne at the Marriott and she was terrific. We had the wedding on the beach at sunset and our reception was poolside.

DJ Randolph was fantastic. I think I sat down 1 time-other than that I was dancing the whole time. He did a terrific job of mixing the music and playing good, upbeat music. The waitstaff and bartender we’re great. We even had the bartender create our own shot we named “The Omar” after our waiter. The food was so great-all of our guests raved about how good it was. We had filet mignon and mahi-mahi. The week went by so fast-We still can’t believe it’s over. Aruba was beautiful and we had such a good time.

Some of the highlights:

We had arranged for Bully to pick us up at the airport and we were coming in with 20 guests. Our flight was delayed in Chicago for almost 3 hours and he and the other drivers waited for us. I can’t say enough about how much we appreciated that. They we’re fantastic. We stopped at the grocery store on the way (Ling and Sons) and got some stuff for the hotel room.

We booked the Jolly Pirates sailing on Sunday for a welcome excursion for our guests from 3-6 and everyone had so much fun. This was such a great time. The entire staff was wonderful. We really created some great memories and everyone was talking about it the rest of the week.

We also did the Green Zebra Tomcars – What a blast!! Our tour guide was so great and friendly and the tomcars we’re so much fun to drive. It was really interesting to get to see a different part of the Island. We really enjoyed this tour. Even my 78 year old Grandma had a good time.

Some of the not so good…..

I used Knipoog for our hair and makeup. Our wedding was on Tues. the 13th. On Monday we went to the salon to do a trial hair and makeup. The hair turned out good for the trial. The make up not so much but I have really sensitive skin so for the actual wedding I had her use my own makeup. They (1 make up artist and 1 stylist) came to our hotel on Tues. to do mine and my Mother’s and bridesmaid’s hair. My younger sister was the first to get her hair done and it was not a good style. She was in tears but the hairstylist redid it. My hair ended up taking 2 1/2 hours to do. It was nothing like the hairstyle I had brought a picture of or like the hairstyle she had created the day before. At one point I had to get up and walk away so I wouldn’t start crying. In the end my hair turned out good but it was very frustrating to get there. It was actually my bridesmaids directing the stylist on what to do in order to get the right look. I also ended up redoing my make up. She used a lot of shiny makeup which made me look shiny and greasy.

We had our rehearsal dinner at Moomba’s on Monday night. I had emailed Moomba’s back in August of ‘09 to arrange the dinner. I had requested the beach tables. They originally were going to set us up on the picnic tables in the ‘garden’ area. I had said we did not want to sit at picnic tables and we didn’t want to be in the garden area. Erika the manager had agreed we would be allowed to use the beach tables from 5-7 and if we wanted to continue after that point we would move off the beach tables. That was acceptable to us. We pre-ordered our menu and paid in advance. When we arrived on Monday with all of our 28 guests they had no tables set up and we’re trying to seat us in the ‘garden area’. When I said that I had been dealing with Erika and since we had booked so far in advance she had agreed to let us use the beachfront tables. They continued arguing with us for 15 minutes and finally agreed when I said I can show them the email saying we would be allowed to use the beach tables. We wanted a nice beachfront dinner and there are plenty of restaurants to choose from and if this was such a problem we would have chose another location but this is something they agreed too so it was very frustrating. There we’re no apologies whatsoever. The funny part was that they said this is normally a very busy night for them- I think we saw maybe 5 other tables being used the entire night if that? I just feel it was really unacceptable that we had booked so far in advance and that this was all set up so far in advance and then to have to deal with that and have no apologies.

Honestly I can say that in the big picture those we’re 2 very minor things to have to deal with and really did not put a damper on anything. We had a amazing time-Our wedding went so smooth and was so much fun we couldn’t have asked for more. We met some really great people and almost everyone we talked to and met we’re friendly that from start to finish it was amazing.

If you have any questions feel free to message me. Hope some of this information helps-I know I got so many answers and so much information from here that really helped make it a great week.

Read the original review posted in the Aruba.com Weddings & Honeymoons forum»
Forum members can also ask her questions via private message»