Sandals Grande St. Lucian
For our honeymoon, we chose Sandals Grande in St. Lucia. We spent five days in Vegas and only had a total of two weeks away from work for both the wedding and the honeymoon. Because of the time constraints, we chose to go somewhere in the Caribbean off the east coast. Sandals is somewhat controversial for some (people either love them or hate them), but when we decided on the Caribbean the choice was easy for us. We had been to Sandals resorts before in Jamaica so we knew what to expect. Plus, both Groom and I dive so Sandals' onsite, included diving is hard to pass up. We had already been to the Bahamas and Jamaica which left a choice of St. Lucia and Antigua. We chose St. Lucia because we live in Atlanta and could get a direct flight with Delta.
Our plan was to fly out of Vegas on the red eye (leaves around 11 pm) to Atlanta on Sunday night. We would land around 6:00 am on Monday morning, take our "wedding luggage" to Groom's truck which was parked at the airport and exchange it for our "honeymoon" luggage, head back through security to the international terminal, grab something to eat, and catch the 9 am flight to St. Lucia. I'll admit that this was my plan. Groom had reservations about the schedule, but I had taken the red eye out of Vegas several times before. Back when Delta was running crazy deals in competition with Airtran, my coworkers and I would take quick trips to Vegas all the time. We would leave from work on Friday and fly back on the red eye late Sunday night. We would land at 6 am, grab breakfast (and a lot of coffee) and be at our desks by 8 am on Monday morning.
But our wedding was not a weekend trip. We had been in Vegas for five days. By the time we were packing to leave, we had about 12 hours of sleep total in the past three nights. We were also tipsy and rushed for time (we hit up a two-for-one happy hour at Le Burger followed by some gambling and lost track of time). We just didn't pay attention to what we put in the checked luggage verses the carry-on luggage. We gave one suitcase to my dad to take home to Atlanta the following day, but accidentally left scissors and other metal in the carry-on. My dad had everything searched at the airport and left us some choice voice-mails about it. Worse, it wasn't until we were standing in the airport parking lot in Atlanta that we realized we put the truck keys in the luggage that was checked directly to St. Lucia. Thus, we could not get in the truck to exchange suitcases. Luckily, my MOH and her husband flew home with us and were nice enough to turn the car around, come back to the airport, and take my wedding dress to their house so we didn't have to take it with us to St. Lucia (it may have had something to do with Groom, who had been carrying the wedding dress through the airport, shouting desperately in the background while I was on the phone: "Tell them to come back! They have to come back!"). We were able to give them the dress, but didn't have enough time to go home, get a spare truck key and make it back to the airport so we had to leave without our luggage (so glad I bought all those new clothes for the honeymoon).
Not having our "honeymoon luggage" for the honeymoon wasn't ideal, but it wasn't a disaster either. We still had what we brought to Vegas and we were able to buy pretty much everything else we needed other than two things. First, we didn't have our diving equipment. Sandals allows free rental of equipment, but its still better to use your own stuff. We didn't end up diving that much so it wasn't a big deal. Second, we didn't have a camera. The only pictures we took on our honeymoon were taken on Groom's phone. Sandals, however, takes a bunch of pictures of you (everywhere: excursions, dinner, ect) and then sells them back to you (its actually a better system than Atlantis which gives stickers which we always lose). It wasn't a huge deal; we just bought a package of photographs from Sandals before we left.
The actual honeymoon was great. Because we had a rondoval, we had a private transfer from the airport to the resort. Some people complain about the ride, but I thought it was great. We were able to see a lot of the island, our driver was friendly and knew a lot about the area, and she would stop the car to let us take pictures, get a drink, ect. The rondoval had a private patio and plunge pool which we used a good bit. It also comes with a butler which took some getting used to, but it was great to have them reserve chairs and pack us a cooler everyday (we aren't the morning people who get to the beach/pool early to reserve chairs for the day). We were really glad we chose the Grande (there are three sandals on the island). We traveled to La Toc for dinner and to look around, but it was very quiet - we were the only two people at the bar. We had a blast at our resort though. We met cool people and ate great food. We didn't want to leave.
Our plan was to fly out of Vegas on the red eye (leaves around 11 pm) to Atlanta on Sunday night. We would land around 6:00 am on Monday morning, take our "wedding luggage" to Groom's truck which was parked at the airport and exchange it for our "honeymoon" luggage, head back through security to the international terminal, grab something to eat, and catch the 9 am flight to St. Lucia. I'll admit that this was my plan. Groom had reservations about the schedule, but I had taken the red eye out of Vegas several times before. Back when Delta was running crazy deals in competition with Airtran, my coworkers and I would take quick trips to Vegas all the time. We would leave from work on Friday and fly back on the red eye late Sunday night. We would land at 6 am, grab breakfast (and a lot of coffee) and be at our desks by 8 am on Monday morning.
But our wedding was not a weekend trip. We had been in Vegas for five days. By the time we were packing to leave, we had about 12 hours of sleep total in the past three nights. We were also tipsy and rushed for time (we hit up a two-for-one happy hour at Le Burger followed by some gambling and lost track of time). We just didn't pay attention to what we put in the checked luggage verses the carry-on luggage. We gave one suitcase to my dad to take home to Atlanta the following day, but accidentally left scissors and other metal in the carry-on. My dad had everything searched at the airport and left us some choice voice-mails about it. Worse, it wasn't until we were standing in the airport parking lot in Atlanta that we realized we put the truck keys in the luggage that was checked directly to St. Lucia. Thus, we could not get in the truck to exchange suitcases. Luckily, my MOH and her husband flew home with us and were nice enough to turn the car around, come back to the airport, and take my wedding dress to their house so we didn't have to take it with us to St. Lucia (it may have had something to do with Groom, who had been carrying the wedding dress through the airport, shouting desperately in the background while I was on the phone: "Tell them to come back! They have to come back!"). We were able to give them the dress, but didn't have enough time to go home, get a spare truck key and make it back to the airport so we had to leave without our luggage (so glad I bought all those new clothes for the honeymoon).
Not having our "honeymoon luggage" for the honeymoon wasn't ideal, but it wasn't a disaster either. We still had what we brought to Vegas and we were able to buy pretty much everything else we needed other than two things. First, we didn't have our diving equipment. Sandals allows free rental of equipment, but its still better to use your own stuff. We didn't end up diving that much so it wasn't a big deal. Second, we didn't have a camera. The only pictures we took on our honeymoon were taken on Groom's phone. Sandals, however, takes a bunch of pictures of you (everywhere: excursions, dinner, ect) and then sells them back to you (its actually a better system than Atlantis which gives stickers which we always lose). It wasn't a huge deal; we just bought a package of photographs from Sandals before we left.
The actual honeymoon was great. Because we had a rondoval, we had a private transfer from the airport to the resort. Some people complain about the ride, but I thought it was great. We were able to see a lot of the island, our driver was friendly and knew a lot about the area, and she would stop the car to let us take pictures, get a drink, ect. The rondoval had a private patio and plunge pool which we used a good bit. It also comes with a butler which took some getting used to, but it was great to have them reserve chairs and pack us a cooler everyday (we aren't the morning people who get to the beach/pool early to reserve chairs for the day). We were really glad we chose the Grande (there are three sandals on the island). We traveled to La Toc for dinner and to look around, but it was very quiet - we were the only two people at the bar. We had a blast at our resort though. We met cool people and ate great food. We didn't want to leave.