Aruba, Jamaica oooo I wanna take ya...

To Barbados!

A few weeks ago we were finally able to wrap up our honeymoon plans! Barbados isn't one of the places we thought we would be honeymooning, but I won't bore/confuse you with the long story involving my parents' timeshares (which I still don't fully understand myself). Regardless, all we want is an all inclusive resort in the Caribbean, and Barbados fits the bill.

Bright and early the Sunday morning after our wedding, the future mister and I will be jetting off to the Almond Casuarina Resort in St. Lawrence Gap, Barbados.

(source - all photos)

I'm REALLY looking forward to being able to unwind with the (no longer!) future mister and the three B's - Beach, Booze and Books. One of the things we liked about this resort is that we can take the complimentary shuttle to check out the beaches and restaurants on the two other Almond properties on the island (just in case we get bored with the selection at our resort). We're also really excited about some of the optional excursions we can take:

Rum & History Tour (of the oldest rum distillery in the world - Mount Gay)
Sunset Cocktail Cruise
Outback 4x4 Tour
Turtle Feeding Trip

Daydreaming about this place will certainly help me through the winter blahs! What criteria did you use to decide on your honeymoon?

to and fro

We have transportation! This has been the BIGGEST headache of wedding planning, thus far, so I'm glad that it has finally been put to rest. Back in the fall I contacted a few companies and the best option turned out to be a company that rents vintage trolleys. Perfect for the type of wedding we're planning! When I asked to sign a contract and place a deposit, however, they told me no because they were redoing their pricing structure after the new year. They said they would hold the date for me and would contact me in January.

Well January came and I didn't feel like waiting so I contacted them. Long story short, after a few emails back and forth, I was told that they were already booked for my date. WHAT?!!!

(source)

Luckily I have an amazing fiance who listened to me rant when I called him from work with steam shooting out of my ears. I was able to get it all out of my system so I could respond diplomatically. The gist of what happened is that another bride inquired before me about using one trolley. Then I inquired about the use of two trolleys. They have three, so it didn't occur to them to tell me that another bride had also reserved the date. Well, when they contacted her after January, she wanted all three. This bride's wedding is, thankfully, in the same town. So a solution was worked out where we can both have the number of trolleys we want at the times we want. Phew! Now, do you want to see what our guests will be riding in?

(source)

Did you provide transportation for your guests?

hotel room blocks

One of the next things on my to do list is booking the hotel room blocks. I've been dragging my feet with this one because there is a bit of a debate on which hotels to book. One argument is location, the other is price. Of course I do not want my guests to pay an astronomical amount on hotel rooms for our wedding, but location is also a big deal. One thing is constant - it is about a 10 minute drive from almost all of the local hotels to our wedding venue. For our rehearsal dinner*, however, the downtown hotels are within walking distance. I prefer this, especially for our wedding party/younger friends, because people can drink to their hearts' content and not worry about having to find a ride back to their hotel. The downtown hotels also allow guests to explore the university, shops, restaurants, etcetera - all without having to worry about finding/paying for a parking spot. BUT, the downtown hotels are significantly more expensive.

So, I've come up with a solution. The least expensive hotels are on the west side of town. We'll choose one hotel in that area to block off rooms, one hotel midway between the west side and downtown, and one hotel downtown. On our wedding website I will include the following map I created, which includes our venues, blocked hotels, and all the other local hotels listed in case any guests wish to book a room somewhere else. Guests can decide for themselves whether they'd like to spend or save, drive or walk. Group transportation to the wedding venue is something I'll deal with later (ugh).

View Hotels in a larger map**

Now before I start blocking off rooms, I thought it would be a good idea to come up with a list of questions. Here they are, with help from a post I read on weddingbee:

• Is there a room block set up fee?
• How many rooms can be booked?
• Can we add more rooms to the block if we start running out?
• Do you charge a fee for unbooked rooms?
• Is there a group discount rate? If there is no group discount rate, do you offer any other discounts such as AAA or military?
• What are the rates for different types of rooms?
• Can you block our guests near each other?
• Is there a deadline for when rooms need to be booked by our guests?
• Is there a minimum night stay requirement?
• Is breakfast included?
• Do you charge an OOT guest bag fee? Are OOT bags delivered to guests' rooms or handed out at the front desk?
• Do you have a shuttle? Can we use it the night of the wedding to shuttle people to/from our venue? Is there an extra fee for this service?

What was your experience like booking hotel room blocks? Are there any questions I'm forgetting to ask?

*We haven't actually booked this yet, so I'm going off of our ideal location. Even if we don't end up going with this place, our rehearsal dinner will most likely be someplace downtown.
**I LOVE Google maps. If you click on any of the hotel markers, you'll see that I included driving distances/times to each of our venues.