Scared of Sandals now - HELP!
 

I leave for my Wedding at Sandals Antigua in exactly 2 months from now. My best friend is a travel agent and she told me it would be great and recommended it. So I just booked, not realizing there was all this research out there to do. After reading all of these negative posts about Sandals being a rip off, I am really worried. Am I just going to have an awful time, or what?? ADVICE, ANYONE, PLEASE!!!

You are opening up a can of worms talking about Sandals.<BR><BR>First of all Tiffany, let me say that no one can ruin your wedding day except you...I am sure that your day will be lovely no matter what.<BR><BR>Antigua is a beautiful Island, and I know you will have a wonderful honeymoon.<BR><BR>Do not ask a question like you did on THIS board, because you will only get negative comments.<BR><BR>Enjoy your day and focus on the "real" meaning of the day!

Tiffany:<BR>Many (?most) of the people who contribute comments here are relatively well travelled. The more you see, the more travel experience you have, the more critical you become IMO. I think of places I loved visiting when first out of college, which I would not enjoy today because I know of better ways to spend my time and money.<BR>Does that diminish my memories of the fun I had then? No way.<BR>If you haven't travelled widely, my bet is you'll like Sandals just fine.<BR>If you had travelled a lot in the past, I suspect you wouldn't have booked it.<BR>Maybe your TA friend knows this, too.<BR><BR>

Thank you SO much for these past two reports. The only place I have been outside of the US is Cancun Mexico on my high school graduation trip! So it sounds to me that Sandals will be perfect. Now I feel better, I was starting to stress! Thanks again!

I think you'll like Sandals better than Cancun, unless you're really a fraternity boy posing as a "Tiffany".

I think you will be just fine.<BR>I am a travel agent. Sandals is not my choice, because I have experienced better. But, I have had a number of couples who repeat at Sandals every year.<BR>I think most people just go into trips with expectations no one could fill.<BR>Sandals food could be better. It is not bad, just not very imaginative.<BR>I have found the rooms to be fine.<BR>As long as you do not expect someone fanning you constantly or standing over you shoulder all time you will be fine.<BR><BR>One recommendation though. Make reservations for the Specialty Resturants as soon as you get there, as these are sometimes difficult to obtain and this is my pet peeve about many All-Inclusive Resorts.

You've got many many years before you become as critical as I and others can be about vacations to the islands. Go, enjoy, laugh, cry, but most of all "Don't worry, Be Happy"! This is YOUR lifetime moment, we are here on these posts because we like to gripe about places we have been to that don't meet our standards or expectations, but if I'm with the one I love NOTHING can take that away or make it "awful". Come back to this board and tell us how wonderful it was!!

Tiffany,<BR>Mary gave you perfect advice. If you have not "been around," you will have the time of your life. <BR>Sandals has its place in the world of travel for people who have not spent time in the Caribbean extensively and are not comfortable yet venturing out into the completely different world the Caribbean has to offer. <BR>You and your friends/family should concentrate on the beauty of your surroundings, the friendliness of the people, and the casual atmosphere that you will have for your special day.<BR>Also, champagne will help smooth over any rough spots and help you get on "island time."<BR>Don't worry, you'll have a wonderful time!

If you listen to everybodys shit about what a bad time they had you will not enjoy your trip. My daughter was married at SRB last may and it was beautiful. If you have noticed most of the complainers dont use their real name when posting. So take them with a grain of salt. Go to the Yahoo Sandals hangout<BR>club and read other replys the Fodors. dont worry you will have a great time. Some people are never happy even if it the best.

Kim: just curious but what does it matter if you use your real name or not?, how would you know?, or do you mean E-MAIL ADDRESS?

Tiffany, congratulations on your upcoming nuptials! That's so exciting! If you know how to roll with it, you will have a wonderful wedding and honeymoon. Especially since you will be going with the one you love, you will have a blast.<BR><BR>And to Susan, Mary, Ramjet, and Caribbean Specialist, . . . your posts are so nice. Even after all the nuttiness w/ the Sandals threads, it's great to see folks offering balanced posts and kind words. See, we're not all nasty at Fodors boards!<BR><BR>btw, my real name is Anita. Huh? is just my middle name ;-)

Tiffany<BR>If you have been reading Loris website - don't worry. It is a hoax! Do you really think that the Lori in the website would really be able to put together such a complicated website? <BR>And lets face it, if everyone has such bad experiences wouldn't you think that Sandals would have gone out of business by now?<BR>And even if things don't go exactly right on your wedding day you will still really enjoy it! You may even laugh about them- we did. We had snow storms, high winds, groom lost his cuff links; in the evening reception we were announced with the wrong name!And we had a whale of a time!! Tiffany, whatever you decide to do, have a great wedding!

you'll find there are better places for information than this board. Keep looking and reading and talk to the wedding coordinator and express your concerns. It may not be what everyone chooses but on this forum one person or a few will post continuously with various names just to stir the pot. Agreed the web page is not complimentary and I wouldn't choose <BR>Sandals or Beaches but it is obvious that that woman has some serious problems with control. I've done some pretty high end resorts even in season and find it hard to believe that she dropped some $22,000 even if it is Canadian on her trip off season.

Tiffany: Don't worry, your wedding will be lovely! The problem with the girl who has the website is far deeper than most people will ever realize. Congrats and have a wonderful time!

xxx<BR>seems like you have some "inside information". Come on, you can't stop there!

Remember this board is full of negativity, I am sure you will have great wedding, be positive about things and make the best of it. I am sure you will have yourself a lovely wedding. Congratulations

It's not that I have any insider information but just from reading between the lines. She can't hold down a job, tried to commit suicide, met her husband on telephone classifieds, didn't know how to open Champage (not that it is a sign of insanity but come on, at that stage in life, most of us have been around it), built this imaginary wedding dream (let's come back to earth Judy Jetson), maxed out credit cards on a stupidly expensive weddingmoon, and generally has overbuilt expectations and an underdeveloped sense of reality.

Let me state that in the above post, I was referring to the bride on the website and not Tiffany the original poster.

Thank you SO much for all the encouraging words. I feel so much better and am now looking forward to our trip again, instead of worrying. I'm not like that girl on the website...I don't expect every detail to be just right. If I did, I wouldn't be putting my wedding day in the hands of people at a resort that does probably 10 weddings a day! I would do a wedding where I could choose everything. Lori just had the wrong idea for what she wanted. Anyways, thanks again to everyone who gave encouraging words...I am back to having butterflies about Antigua now! :)

We like you saw many negative postings before we went to Sandals Antigua in April. We have been to Sandals resorts 7 times this was our first to Antigua, and we could not imagine this resort being this bad. We had a great time at Sandals Antigua. The resort is so laid back and relaxing we would go back again. Yes there are some ants in the room at time but you are in the tropics. The beach vendors are not that bad, just say no thanks and they move on, we actually made friends with one of them, his name was Hazel and he talked to us many a time and we learned alot about his family and culture. We always travel with another couple and they loved the resort also, and we met a 3rd couple there who we had met in Jamaica last year and they had a great time. I think when people say they do not like the food, the reason is they are not use to upscale type dining and dinners. The OK Corral is great and the lobster is very good. If you would like a nice relaxing day, what we did was hired one of the local taxi guys for 5 hours and let him take you to all the sites at your own pace. We even asked him to take us to a nice place for a light lunch and we paid his way. His name was FISH and he was very good, very knowledgeable, and everybody knew him everywhere we went. We stayed in the Honeymoon beachfront concierge rooms and we liked that location and how quite it was, but to each his own. Yes we found a couple of the employees to have bad attitudes but most of them were very friendly and treat you as you treat them. As for drinks they will make them as you ask, if you want doubles or triples you get them.