Destination Weddings in Puerto Rico

So after much strife, I have finally chosen to get married in Puerto Rico and have a destination wedding. This is to inform you of costs, and that you should not waste your time hunting for an all-inclusive wedding package in PR. They don't exist. I will also include all of my research on hotels, venues, flights and how I came to the decision of where to go. I will start with the end. I have decided on Ponce Hilton after much research. The Hilton's in PR are the ONLY hotels that offer a small inexpensive, partially inclusive wedding package. For more exquisite plans, I recommend the Gran Melia, and for the most part, you can even sit in on a timeshare briefing and save several hundred dollars off of your hotel. You can click on the link above to check out the site.

So here is what I found on my initial Hotel Search and their average costs:

	2/5-2/11 Th-W	2/6-2/12 Fr-Th	2/7-2/13 Sat-fr	2/7-2/11 SAT-WED	NOTES
Melia NE coast	$1402	$1442	$1409	1029	280 (1361) garden suite (Orbitz) Royall 344 (1674) orbitz
Rincon beach resort	$1259	$1300	$1267	934
El Conquistador NE coaset	$1356	$1396	$1363	$998	Very Nice Partial Ocean View 369-Garden 319
Tropical Inn				$779	Three hotels at same address (strange)
Villa Montana	$1171	$	$1277	$1171	$

Here are some of the details of the various hotels and what they provide/offer:

	Copamarina	Gran Melia	Yunque Rio Mar	Conquistador	Caribe Playa Beach Resort	Rincon beach resort west coast	Villa Montana Beach Resort Wedding
Location/ testimonies	Guanica/all-inclusive option-hard beds like regular resort-near ponce	Near Rio Grande, gorgeous rooms!!		Compact, great beaches, with activities	20 miles from Bioluminescent Bay – SE side near SAN JUAN	2-3 hours Upscale 5 *** beaches not great for swimming but pretty – really quiet	All villas are different lots of weddings
Distance fm airport							2-3 hours, northwest PR (Aquadilla airport 15 mins)
Stuff in walking distance		Food 8 miles		½ mile walk for food			1mile food jobos beach crashboat beach
Wedding costs/stuff
Cost to stay
Things to do locally	No Golf or casoino or club – beachside beds – no swimming on the beach	Adventure charter, sailing, 5-8 miles from rain forest	Casino, spa, golf, tennis, restaraunts, old san juan	Nearby island Vieques, kayaking, water part			Tropical trail rides, happy bellysm, lazy parot in rincon, bay, rocky beaches calm water- private beaches 3 miles -rincon is 45 mins

Now we can begin to drill down to the wedding package search and some of the costs. Although I also considered the Inn at Blue Horizon on Vieques Island and Villa Montana on the other side of the Island, they did not respond to my emails after a week which frustrated me. I don't like making phone calls when emails will do the trick. Although they were both very detailed for small intimate and extravagant weddings, they had a lot of character, and I am not sure that our variety of guests would all be comfortable in hotels with character. Also, they were well over $1,500 for a package.

Unfortunately during this endeavor, I have learned that weddings are for everyone else to enjoy, I just want to dress up in the dress and get a picture and hike down an aisle and marry the man of my dreams! Is that so much to ask? I don't want to spend thousands of dollars. Anyways, here is the findings for wedding packages.

	All Inclusive Resort	Close to Major Airport?	Cost for 4 days Expedia (including air)	Wedding packages
Gran Melia	No	No	$930	Coordinator, plan your own
Hilton Ponce	No	No	$748	$570
Hilton Caribe	No	Yes	$1028	$463

Now, the Hiltons include fboutanairre and bouqet, cake, manicure/pedicure for bride and groom, one free night for your anniversary, and a coordinator.

So you will still need:

Music, legal documents and fees, a venue (which they may allow their beach to be used free), extra flowers, and an officiator.
What you can't see here is the Ponce results, this one turned up the cheapest hands down on every single search. Since there are no all-inclusive resorts, it seems to me that I should get the best value for my hotel and save my money for food and other necessities.

As for the Hilton, I did more research on pricing, I typically like to compare the package rate through a major online provider and that of the hotel, and then separate the flight and hotel prices and determine which way is the cheapest. Yes, I know, my research is extremely time consuming and in-depth. I want to be sure I am getting a great deal and not just spending my money on hidden fees.

Now that I have chosen a hotel, and my dates are flexible, lets make sure I get the best price. I prefer using priceline, they tend to be a tad bit cheaper than Expedia, but they dont have as many search features, so I have to jump back and forth.

So here are my Hilton Ponce findings:

Dates:	5-8 Feb	5-9 Feb	6-12 Feb	5-13 Feb	5-14 Feb
Priceline Flight (Ponce)				559	494
Priceline Flight (San Juan)					387
Priceline Hotel		797
Actual Hotel site		600 / 751
Actual Hotel Package		835 / 930
Priceline Package Ponce		1400 each
Priceline Package deal (San Juan)	748/ For both 1495	803 (expedia) For both 1795 (Expedia) Executive ste	1046

As you can see, I quickly learned that flying into Ponce is WAY too expensive since we are planning on getting a rental car.