crislen

Hi everyone. I currently have a reservation with Dollar to rent a mini van after our Carnival cruise in May.

I've been doing some reading and have read how absolutely horrible the wait for the shuttle to the car rental place is. I know they run every 30-45 minute, but it is really insane? Am I looking at 2+ hours to get the car?

Does anyone have an recent experience? Dollar / Thrifty seems to have the best rates. We like Budget, but MIA pick/up drop off is 70$ cheaper than port pickup / MIA dropoff.

HI all,

I tried searching, but couldn't find an answer so I'm asking :)

We are flying into MIA the day before our cruise and are hoping to pick up diapers / beach toys / possibly clothes since we are flying in from a cold destination and may not have all the warm weather clothes we need for my toddler yet!

We are staying at the Days Inn Miami Airport North and are taking the shuttle to and from the airport.

Is there a store within walking distance or a cheap cab ride where I can pick up supplies?

As well, we are staying at the same hotel when we arrive back and are looking at renting a car. Is there a good outlet mall around? (I can google this easier and I will)

Thanks!

Crystal

Here are the things I would have done differently:

Packed more efficiently:

Made sure everything was properly labelled and I knew where in the bags to find them. The morning before the wedding was a gong show getting us there and we lost some parts of the DIY stuff that I had worked on.

Told the piano player to make the first dance song shorter: instead she added extra verses and for my fiance and I who aren't dancers and aren't centers of attention, this was painful :D

Prepared a Day-of-TIme line in advance: It was on my list of things to do, but I forgot!

Prepared a must have pose list for photos: We got great photos, but I am missing some of my fun one I really wanted.

Brought touch-up makeup: The makeup artist was great, but I sweat... a lot... and wore these big white sunglasses before we went to check-in which combined with sweat left marks in my makeup. So then I needed to touch-up and my MOH is about 4 skin colours too dark and she was the only one with stuff... it looked really really funny close up!

Other than that, it actually went very smoothly!

Welcome back Heather!! It sounds like it was a bit of a whirlwind at the beginning - I can't believe the coordinators were so ... ugh!! But you're now married and have a great story to tell - but I know it definitely doesn't feel that way at that time!! Thank you for sharing all your information - I wish I could have read it before my wedding - it is great to share!

On the photographer and prices... my gawd, I think we all had the same experience!!

The pricing system on the ships are so different than what we were given. When they gave us only 2 package prices that were more than double the prices given to us by Carnival when we first booked, I nearly died. I started crying since I had only budgetted $2000 for our photos to get the top package. Well... the 2 choices they gave us STARTED at triple that.

I think it is completely misleading - we weren't even given a package option that didn't include the photo storybooks they made. I hate to admit it, but the photographers made a pretty penny out of us. But... they made me look skinny in the photos! They did throw in all the of the formal night portraits and casual night shots for most of our cruising group for us as a wedding present (so 30 extra photos in total) It all depends on the ship and the photographer!

So don't feel bad... they screw with all the brides on pictures :(

Lipz you are amazing! :D

I had a copy of instructions that a lovely lady sent me a while ago. Unfortunately, my email crashed and I lost it :(

Could I get a copy as well? I wasn't going to do one, but I have a feeling since about 25% of our guests are first time cruisers, I'll need to with all the questions I'm getting.

crislen@hotmail.com

Thanks!!