Bunny’s Destination Wedding at Sandals La Source in Grenada
The Bunnies got married at the Sandals La Source in Grenada in October 2016, in the middle of the hurricane season, but escaped unscathed. Read below about the Bunnies’ Sandals’ wedding experience.
Not a Great Believer in Marriage
Bunny is not a great believer in the institution of marriage. Married she is, nevertheless, to the lovely Mr. Bunny (bless his heart).
The Bunnies are not known for their romantic gestures and they never fancied a big wedding. When the time was ripe, they wanted to use their money for the honeymoon instead. So they decided to get hitched and marry on the beach somewhere. After having studied a couple of options, they were convinced that the marriage should take place on the small Caribbean island of Grenada.
Destination Wedding in Grenada
The Bunnies have a special relationship with Grenada. Years and years and years ago, Mr. Bunny made the wise decision to be born on that island. Although he didn’t stick around for long afterwards, he secured himself a passport for life with that little act.
Bunny’s original idea (Mr. Bunny had little input to the wedding preparations - is anyone surprised?) was to get married on Sandy Island, a small uninhibited island off the coast of Carriacou. Carriacou is one of Grenada’s smaller islands where the Bunnies own some land and plan to build their future residence.
However, after some initial research, Bunny concluded that this would be too complicated. The paperwork, the logistics, the slow pace of things in Grenada, the uncertainty… Bunny simply didn’t have the time or energy for that. She was too busy working and planning the honeymoon, which far exceeded the importance of the actual wedding in her estimation.
Sandy Island and other beautiful spots in Grenada
Sandals Wedding for Free
So enter Sandals. Bunny was aware of Sandals, of course, but she had never stayed at any of their properties. She thought Sandals catered more to mass tourism and she wasn’t a big fan of their style in general. That said, Bunny liked what she read about the Sandals’ wedding offers.
Basically, if you stay at a Sandals hotel for 3 nights or more, they will organise your wedding for free, including the ceremony venue, a bouquet, a reception, honeymoon dinner, wedding cake and more. They will also take care of all the necessary paperwork at the location (as long as you send them all the required documents in advance) so you can just relax, or, alternatively, obsess about every single detail with their dedicated wedding planner if you so wish.
Needless to say, Bunny didn’t want to obsess. She wanted a simple beach wedding, with just her and Mr. Bunny in attendance, far from curious crowds and hapless onlookers. In addition, she wanted a strictly non-religious ceremony (the only God Bunny is a fan of is the one on Facebook, check him out, he’s quite funny sometimes). If Sandals was willing to throw in a nice wedding cake too, all the better.
Sandals offers perfect perfect amenities for destination wedding
Minimum Hassle
Once Bunny had set her mind on a Sandals wedding and sent all the necessary documents to Sandals Grenada (admittedly a bit later than the required two months before the wedding), she could forget about all the other arrangements until very close to the wedding. The wedding date and time (Sandals gives you a number of slots to choose from) had been decided and the other details were left for later.
Top Tip
A wedding at sunset is the romantic ideal, a dream come true for many brides-to-be. Sandals knows this too. You will have to pay a big premium if you want to have your wedding at sunset. Don’t bother, Bunny says. You will have your sunset later for no extra charge anyway.
Bunny was not concerned about the decoration, music, menu, flowers or any of the other details offered by Sandals as upgrades to the “basic” wedding. As a result, Bunny didn’t have much contact with the Sandals team or have to go through their wedding catalogues in detail before the trip to Grenada. Instead, she spent two days in Barcelona, looking for (and finding!) the perfect wedding dress. In sharp contrast, the Bunnies spent 10 minutes in the Sandals gift ship two days before the wedding to put together Mr. Bunny’s wedding outfit…
The Bunnies had opted for a seven-night stay in Sandals Grenada. On their second day, they met the very capable and friendly wedding planner who went through the details with them. As the Bunnies were very easy-going about the details and didn’t want any extras, the meeting was short and made even more pleasant by the sparkling wine generously poured for the soon-to-be bride and groom.
The Wedding Location
Bunny's preferred wedding location: a secluded spot on the beach
The biggest question mark for Bunny was the exact location of the ceremony. Sandals Grenada has a number of dedicated wedding locations (the pavilion in the jungle, the pier, the pavilion on the beach etc). All are beautiful and romantic, but not for Bunny. She wanted exclusivity.
Thankfully, Pink Gin Beach, a gorgeous beach where Sandals is located, is quite long. Bunny was able to convince the wedding planner that she wanted her staff to organise Bunny’s wedding at the remotest corner of that beach. This meant lugging the cake, the table and chairs to the furthest corner of the property. Luckily, the wedding planner kindly agreed, quietly remarking that this had never been done before.
Once the location was settled, Bunny had no more questions or concerns about the wedding. Instead, she and Mr. Bunny could concentrate on relaxing in the lovely Sandals surroundings, downing cocktails and gorging on the delicious food before the big day.
Cake Tasting
Actually, there was one more important task for the Bunnies before the wedding: choosing the flavour of the wedding cake!
A special tasting session was organised by the wedding planner. The flavours to choose from were vanilla, chocolate, Caribbean fruit and red velvet. The Bunnies took this task very seriously indeed. They diligently went through all the flavours, savouring them for a long time before making their final decision.
In the end, the Bunnies chose a chocolate cake; of course, there was never any doubt about that. The cake-tasting episode was a lot of fun regardless. For once, Mr. Bunny was allowed as much cake as he wanted without Bunny constantly nagging about it!
The Paperwork is a Breeze
Although Sandals takes care of all the official paperwork related to the wedding, you do have to make a personal appearance at the Prime Minister’s office in the capital St. George’s a couple of days before the wedding in order to get the wedding license.
This is all organised by Sandals, of course. You are whisked away to St. George’s in a comfy car, possibly with another couple in a similar situation. Then there is a bit of waiting inside the offices before you are requested to sign the papers and voila, there’s your permission to marry in Grenada.
This is hardly hard work although the whole affair does occupy a couple of hours of your beach time. The main requirement for getting married in Grenada is that you will have spent at least three days in the country before the wedding can take place.
Bunny's pre-wedding bliss at Sandals
The Big Day
The Bunnies’ Big Day dawned rainy. This was hurricane season after all. Bunny started despairing a bit when the rain showed no signs of relenting about an hour before the 3pm wedding. When you plan to get married on the beach you really do not want to stand in the pouring rain during the ceremony, not even if you have a fancy parasol (one of Bunny’s few purchases from the Sandal’s wedding catalogue).
Bunny was reassured by the wedding planner that in case the rain didn’t stop, there would be an alternative wedding location for them. The problem was, Bunny didn’t want any alternative location, she wanted her perfectly chosen and carefully selected beach spot.
Hair and Make-Up
Bunny had her make-up and fur (hair) done at the Sandals Red Lane Spa while she was obsessing about the weather. This was a Sandals extra she simply couldn’t say no to.
The spa was wonderful and Bunny had all the confidence in her therapist, particularly as they had done a rehearsal two days earlier. It was so relaxing not to have to worry about her looks and leave it all to the professionals.
Ceremony
Miraculously, the heavens stopped crying about half an hour before the Bunnies’ scheduled wedding ceremony.
So the Bunnies were able to make their way to the far end of the Pink Gin beach barefooted, without getting soaked on the way. Sandals also had a bridal golf cart for these purposes but Bunny wouldn’t have been seen dead in that thing. Plus, it would have been difficult to ride the golf cart on the beach anyway. Clearly, it was meant for more sophisticated weddings.
The ceremony was presided over by a friendly Minister who didn’t have too much trouble pronouncing Bunny’s challenging Nordic surname. The Sandals wedding planner and one of her staff acted as the necessary witnesses.
"I do!"
It was beautiful, it was intimate, it was exactly as Bunny had envisioned her perfect wedding. Despite his threats to do so, Mr. Bunny didn’t flee the scene at the last minute, so the Bunnies were pronounced man and wife on the gorgeous Grenadian beach exactly as planned.
As an extra (see, they are not always stingy!), the Bunnies had opted for a sand ceremony where they filled a glass vail with different coloured sand from Grenada, taking turns pouring the sand into the vail. The end result was beautiful and the vail is a nice memento of the special day.
Wedding Photography and Video
The Bunnies had opted not to have a Sandals photographer for the wedding (more about that decision below). The Bunnies had been offered a variety of photo and video packages, but were compelled to decline in light of the eye-watering prices. A couple of staff members were present with their cameras, taking snapshots and shooting video of the main event nonethless. The Bunnies were happy to purchase some of these images afterwards to have some of the key moments captured on film.
In addition, Sandals produced a very nice video of the wedding ceremony that was available for purchase later. This came as a lovely surprise for the Bunnies, particularly as the price of the video was very reasonable (compared to the general pricing at Sandals).
Wedding Reception
A bare bones wedding reception is included in the free Sandals wedding package. For Bunnies, this was easy as there were no guests. The Sandals staff had set up a lovely table and chairs for the Bunnies close to the wedding location on the remote corner of the Pink Gin Beach. It was there that the Bunnies signed the (lovely) old-fashioned wedding registry of Grenada and enjoyed their wedding cake, sparkling wine and some vegetarian canapés. It was far from prying eyes, just the Bunnies and friendly staff in attendance. Another lovely moment!
Wedding Dinner
For their wedding dinner, the Bunnies could have chosen any of the resort’s restaurants. They decided to make it a bit more special and opted for a private dinner on the pier. This cost extra, of course, but even Mr. Bunny thought it was worth the cost.
The Bunnies had been able to choose their (vegetarian) menu in advance and they had a dedicated server at their disposal for the evening. It was absolutely charming to dine on the candle-lit pier and enjoy wine, gazing into the drunken eyes of your newly-wedded spouse whilst listening to the ocean around you.
Bunny's lovely wedding dinner setup and sunset at Sandals Grenada
Bunny was in a festive mood so she even did a little dance to the music of her favourite “satanic” band playing on her i-Pad. (Check out the Bunnies’ theme song Year Zero by Ghost - Bunny challenges you to find more romantic wedding music than that!)
The Wedding Night
Bunny won’t go into details here. Sandal’s came through with flying colors, decorating the Bunnies’ room nicely, having delivered the remaining wedding cake to the room and even placing a door sign of “just wedded” outside the room that night and for the following morning.
Wedding Photographer
With their free weddings, there is at least one area where Sandals tries to upsell you: the wedding photography. Don’t fall into this trap.
Sandals offers seemingly a lot of options for wedding photography but when you study the offers more closely, you will notice that they are all outrageously expensive. Bunny was having none of it.
So months in advance she embarked on a little online research, Googling Grenada photographers, checking out their work online and contacting a select few for a quote with her specific requirements. All were very friendly and responsive. Bunny could have selected any of them, really, but ended up with Derek Pickell.
This turned out to be a good choice. Derek was professional, friendly and reliable. Most importantly, he produced a lovely set of wedding pictures with the unfortunate material he had to work with (i.e. Bunny and Mr. Bunny). His price was very reasonable and Bunny was happy to pay directly to the photographer, instead of supporting the corporate Sandals machine.
One important caveat though: Sandals doesn’t allow any outside photographers on their property (wonder why?). So Bunny had to be creative. Luckily she is familiar with Grenada and knew that there are a number of lovely beaches very close to Sandals. With Derek’s input, she chose the picturesque beach in front of the La Luna hotel as the location of the wedding shoot, an easy 10-minute drive from Sandals.
Bunny's wedding pictures were taken on this gorgeous beach in Grenada
Derek came to pick Bunny and Mr. Bunny from Sandals after the wedding ceremony and the whole photography session took about two hours. As the rain had stopped, Bunny even got a (kind of) sunset for her photos. The beach was empty (as it most often is) and the Bunnies were enjoying a bottle of sparkling wine during the experience. This may or may not have reflected in the pictures towards the end of the shoot…
All in all, Bunny was very happy with her choice of an outside photographer. Did this require a little bit of effort? Sure. Was it worth doing it to save 1,5k USD? Hell yeah! That buys you a whole lot of champagne for the honeymoon.
Top Tip: Sandals Inclusions
Make sure you get all the inclusions you are entitled to according to the room rate you pay. Bunny’s rate included a couple’s massage and a sunset cruise for two. Neither were mentioned by Sandals’ staff when the Bunnies checked in. Bunny had to raise the extras herself and even then, she had to produce proof (email confirmations - make sure you have these ready) that this was indeed the case. In the end, Bunny and Mr. Bunny very much enjoyed both complimentary activities but Sandals was certainly not forthcoming with coughing them up.
However, upon on arrival, the Bunnies did get a nice room upgrade for the duration of their stay at Sandals Grenada so it was not all bad news about the reception staff…
Sandals' sunset cruise and Bunny's upgraded hotel suite with a lovely outdoor bath tub
Conclusion
Is a Sandals wedding worth it? For the Bunnies, the answer is absolutely yes! With some independent planning, opting for the bare bones free concept and adding their own flavour by choosing a remote location, the Bunnies got their dream beach wedding. It felt authentic and individual, not like some run-of-the-mill cookie-cutter Sandals’ wedding organisation. And, for once, Bunny can state with full confidence that the price was right.
