My Wedding Experience at Sandals Royal Bahamian Resort

Recently, I was married at Sandals Royal Bahamian Resort in Nassau, Bahamas. I cannot say enough good things about weddings at the Sandals Resorts. It truly was a dream wedding and a wonderful start to my life with my new husband, Josh.

Sandals Resorts are located in Nassau, Jamaica, St. Lucia, and Antigua. We chose the Bahamas resort for a couple of reasons. My now husband and I had been to Nassau/Paradise Island before, on a cruise several years prior. I also had a stepbrother and his now wife get married at the same resort, and they had raved about how nice it was. We love the beach. We love the warm ocean breezes. We live in Minnesota; even an August day could be ruined by bad weather. We didn't want to risk that, and we wanted a different wedding. My husband hates attending weddings. He certainly is not anti marriage at all; he just hates typical standard weddings. We wanted something different, and it wasn't about having 200 people attend our wedding. We are in our late twenties/early thirties; it's not about that. The marriage is about us. We were lucky to have about 30 close family members and friends attend our beach wedding, but we certainly didn't expect any to attend. We also plan on having a reception back in Minnesota, for more friends/family to celebrate.

Sandals does truly make it easy to get married. You think you should be doing more planning, but you don't have to. Sandals does do it all for you. In my particular situation, we did have a few children attending our wedding. This got tricky. Unfortunately, kids are only allowed for the ceremony only. We had to have family members take the two little ones back to their own resort right after the wedding. I know people hated this, but it was the rule. I tried hard not to let it ruin my day. After all, I was in paradise. They were all in paradise; they just had to go back to their own resorts quicker than they may have wanted to. People that attend the wedding at Sandals but do not stay at the resort do have to purchase a day pass, but this allows people to eat all the food they want, drink all the drinks they want, and participate in any included activities at Sandals. Before the wedding, you will also need to call and purchase your photo and DVD package. Other than sorting out the children situation, picking out photo/DVD package, and making sure people had called to reserve/pay for their day passes, the rest of the wedding planning happened at the resort itself once you arrived.

As soon as we arrived at Sandals, we were given a package with information about our first wedding coordination meeting. It was held the next morning. We first went to the court office in downtown Nassau. Sandals provided all transportation for this. We had to sign some documents in order to get government documents to be legally married. All Sandals marriages are considered legal marriages anywhere you live. After we arrived back to Sandals, we had a brief break (time for lunch!) and then had our wedding coordination meeting. At this meeting, you pick out your type of ceremony (civil or religious), type of flowers, and other various details. Make sure to print out your guest list and have that with you. I did not do this, because I had emailed it all to one wedding coordinator based with Sandals Weddings in Miami, and it was never emailed to the actual resort in the Bahamas. We didn't know last names of a few significant others of our guests, so were left with guessing a few names! In this meeting, you will also determine the order of your wedding ceremony. For example, you will determine when you may pass out roses for a rose ceremony, and we also did a sand ceremony, which was an option. In the sand ceremony, you and your new spouse pour equal amounts of colored sand into a vase at different intervals, signifying your new unity. Our sand ended up being wet unfortunately, so it may have not been a smooth transition, but provided some humor in our ceremony when we were "dumping" the sand! Keep in mind that you are only given one set of flowers (the bridal bouquet) for free, and that is a very basic (carnations) bouquet. There is an up-charge for different types of flowers; mine ended up being a beautiful bouquet of pink roses and stargazer lilies (my favorite!). There is also a charge for bridesmaid/groomsmen flowers, as well as the sand ceremony. In our ceremony, we also had my sister sing a solo. There was use of a cordless microphone. This is something you will have to make sure is available as soon as possible.

After your initial meeting, there really isn't much left to do! You will want to make sure you have appointments set up with the salon if you are planning on getting your hair or nails done. They suggested I get my nails done 1 day before our wedding. I wouldn't do this again. I did get the manicure the day before, but they were already chipped by the next day. Luckily, they touched them up for free on the day of the wedding while I was getting my hair done. After you are done with your appointments, you just need to go back to your room to continue getting ready. Sandals does photos after the ceremony, so I was able to have my fiancee get ready at someone else's room and he never saw me in my dress until I had walked down the aisle of sand. When it is time for the ceremony, the wedding coordinator will come to your room with your flowers and lead you to the wedding. She'll let you know when to start walking down the aisle, in my case with my father.

Our wedding ceremony went well. All our guests had been told by us where to go for the wedding~in our case, the beach. Each guest had a chair. After the ceremony, the coordinators set up a table right on the beach where we signed the marriage certificates. My sister was my matron of honor and Josh's best friend was his best man. They signed as witnesses. Right after signing, the photographer took us to a few places on the resort to take photographs. Right after pictures, we were led (with the best man and matron of honor) to have cake. You only get to eat cake with a few guests, but it's nice to have "your first cake" together. You will also be served champagne, or in my case, white wine (allergy to champagne). Soon after, all of our guests (minus children) were able to eat together at a nearby restaurant. Because we did have quite a few guests, the wedding coordinator had made a reservation for us at the restaurant. You can also do private receptions in which there will be no other Sandals guests present, but this would cost extra. It did not seem important for us to charge our guests even extra to get a private room, when they had already paid the guest pass if they weren't staying at Sandals. It worked out wonderful! We had several tables set aside for us, and there just so happened to be a band! Since our wedding was on a Saturday, they had a band on Saturday nights. We were even able to have our first dance together, a father/daughter dance, and many other dances. We were lucky; bands would usually not occur for most weddings. Our wedding was also at 4 pm, so it flowed well into dinner and dancing. Other weddings are earlier in the day, and thus there would be a time block in the middle, in which people would probably want to hang out on the beach, etc.

After your wedding, there are just a few details to iron out before you leave the resort. You will be told by the photographer on your wedding day when you can go to the Sandals photo shop and select photos. They will then print them for you and you will receive an album of the photos. You can also buy Sandals picture frames at the shop. Also, make sure to remember to pick up your sand vase, if you did the sand ceremony. You are also supposed to get to take the cake home with you, but unfortunately, ours never arrived. You should also receive 2 t-shirts, One Female shirt that says "Just" and one male shirt that says "Married".

Sandals is a wonderful resort family for destination weddings. It will not only be a dream come true for you, but also your guests!