Carnival Pride Wedding

[bride2b24]

Hi everyone! Im getting married on the Carnival Pride out of Baltimore on May 15, 2011. Can anyone give me any reviews, advice or just a few tips just to help me make my day as stress free as possible.

[soon2bmrsspd]

Can you provide a few more details, such as... will you be getting married on embarkation day? In port somewhere else? Will it be the intimate package, or a full guest wedding? Will you have a reception onboard? What are your thoughts for entertainment for the reception. I can give you tips and tricks based upon my experiences with my onboard wedding last year, but I do not want to bore you, or get you excited about details that you might not be experiencing based on your package, or location.

[bride2b24]

Can you provide a few more details, such as... will you be getting married on embarkation day? In port somewhere else? Will it be the intimate package, or a full guest wedding? Will you have a reception onboard? What are your thoughts for entertainment for the reception. I can give you tips and tricks based upon my experiences with my onboard wedding last year, but I do not want to bore you, or get you excited about details that you might not be experiencing based on your package, or location.

 

 

I will be getting married onboard before we leave Baltimore. I am expecting about 60 guests and having the 1 hour reception with a Dj.

[Tiffany1203]

Did you get to request the location of your wedding?

[soon2bmrsspd]

Did you get to request the location of your wedding?

 

You will not get to request your location on Carnival. Your location will be based on other weddings that day, as well as how many guests you have attending. I am sure you can make a request, but it really will be based on the above. I booked my wedding almost a year in advance, and I was not the first one booked. You will be given your location about 2 weeks ahead of time.

Bride2b24.... I was married aboard the Fantasy last July. I did not have an embarkation wedding, I was married on the ship in Nassau. I will not be able to help with tips on the specifics of an embarkation wedding, however, I will let you know about a few details of mine that will be relevant.

Embarkation.... getting all the wedding related items onboard was a challenge, as I did not want to check anything wedding related. I had to have multiple people carry the packages, attire, and suite cases full of things. I did my own flowers, favors, gifts, unity ceremony, music, and just about every other little detail you can imagine, so all of that had to go onboard in one swoop. The security did not complain much, and the only snag I had was getting the attire through the scanner, and the flowers. They made me open the box of flowers to make sure they were not real as you cannot take live flowers out of the country. The flowers were not exactly easy to get to, but we managed.

Group.... We did a group booking through Carnival which got us a discount, and some additional amenity perks for the group. We had 27 people sail with us. With the amenity points I was able to give everyone a bottle of wine at the first nights dinner with a personalized message, and I was able to get a 1 hour private cocktail party, which I used as sort of a rehearsal dinner. I gave out the gifts that I had purchased, and made for my guests and wedding party. It was VERY NICE and came with a 1 hour open bar.

Onboard coordinator.... My onboard coordinator was fabulous!!!! She is the one person on the boat that I feel made my day. She was in contact with me 2-3 times per day on the ship up until the day of the wedding. She knew every detail of my vision, and saw to it that everything was perfect. After the wedding, she told me she was just as stressed as I was, since I literally had everything planned to the minute detail.

The Wedding Experience coordinator.... I will not go into too much detail about her, as I do not want the post removed, but I will say that I could have done without her, and she is the reason that it took 5 months after my wedding date to finally get it legalized (this was a foreign wedding though so you will be fine, I promise). I will also say that she had one 10 minute conversation with me regarding the wedding, and thought she knew exactly how I wanted it. So much so, that she argued with my mother loudly in front of my guests. My mother won, of course, but my advice to you, since you will not have a great length of time with your coordinators since you will have an embarkation wedding, is to MAKE SURE that your mother, your sister, your wedding party EACH ALL KNOW exactly how you want EVERYTHING, as you will not be there when it all goes down. All you will do is walk in, and walk down the aisle.

The ceremony.... was everything I had ever dreamed of and more. It was picture perfect... The music guy played everything so perfect, and perfectly blended the songs. All I did was put the full songs in order on ONE CD. I figured if they were on 1 CD, in order, then no one could mess it up, and you would not hear the changing of the CD's. The only snag during the ceremony was the minister that TWE hired, did not follow my ceremony outline at all. Not one word of it. Nor did he follow what I had written for the sand ceremony which included my children. I was upset at the time, but still think everything was perfect. After all, that is what he does for a living, and what he said was just as nice as what I had wrote.

Photography.... The ships photographer was better than anyone I could have ever paid for. The pictures were absolutely amazing!!! I have heard a few complaints in this area, but for the most part in reviews, above average is the norm. I will tell you, what every you have budgeted for pictures, double it!!! My reason for this is I ended up buying EVERY single picture and here is why. Say you pick the $1000.00 package, which has X amount of 8X10's and 30 something 5X7's. ALL of the 5X7's will be your ceremony and reception. Your 8x10’s will be the posed pictures around the ship. It is EXTREMELY hard to pick 30 pictures that encompass each and every highlighted moment of your ceremony and reception. Think about it, entrance of you, your party, your parents, etc... The vows, the rings, the kiss, the announcement, the unity stuff, your exit, your entrance into the reception, the dances, the toasts, the cake cutting, etc... There are more that 30 special moments, and some of them require 2 or more pictures. I know you might think you can rely on your friends and family for some of those pictures, but in my case, and in many others, those pictures did not turn out good. The room in which I had my ceremony was peach, and each and every picture that was taken by friends and family had an orange glow, and looked terrible. Obviously the photographer knew this, and was able to compensate for it, because his pictures were perfect! Same for the reception, it was in the disco, as will yours if you hired the DJ. The disco is dark, and has many "disco lights" that will glare in an amateur camera. Just keep these things in mind when trying to budget for a picture package, I would have sat and cried for days if I was depending on my families pictures after I saw them. Another advantage to buying every picture, was I was able to get multiple CD's, multiple DVD's, and even the pictures that he did not print due to him not liking them. I also got 2 albums, and 3 large canvasses which are the highlight of the whole thing. I even made him throw in all of the pictures that they took around the ship that you pay 20 bucks each for at the end of your cruise. I simply said, I will buy the whole package if you throw in all of these too, because I am not going to spend X.XX amount on wedding pictures, then give you more for the fun pictures that the ship people take, such as formal night, etc…

More about photography..... The photographer will come to your room while you are getting ready. He took some very nice pictures of me holding my flowers, staring out the window, on the balcony, etc. These are some of my favorites. He will then walk with you to the ceremony and take pictures just before you go in. He is there for every moment of the ceremony. Then after the ceremony he will take pictures at the altar of you and your family, and you and your wedding party. I would suggest you have someone there with a check list of what you want, as you will be limited on time while everyone gets to your reception. He will take pictures during your whole reception, then afterwards he will take you around the whole ship for other pictures. I have some great pictures of us walking away from him, my flowers out, and the red “tail” in the background. He also took some great ones with Atlantis behind us, but we were in Nassau. At this point you will be a ship celebrity, so be prepared, as all of the passengers will be arriving, and you will get many of applauses, etc... A few nights later, your photographer will set up an appointment for viewing the photos. You will leave the ship with the pictures that you want to purchase. I even left with my canvases.

Reception.... My reception was AWESOME!!! It was in the disco as I hired the DJ. The DJ played all of my BURNED music, for my special songs. We had more than enough time to do everything. I know everyone seems to think that the time will be tight, however, we played the entire song for the 3 special dances, did the cake cutting, the toast, 4 speeches, 5 special requested songs, and several group dances. There was still time left. The food was OUTSTANDING!!!!! They prepared everything from the hot and cold menu, not just 4 each like they say, they also had sushi which was not on the menu, and they had chicken nuggets for the kids. My spread looked beautiful, they even had an ice sculpture in the middle which I was NOT expecting. Everything was just so perfect.

After the wedding. We were recognized by several people on the ship. We were introduced at dinner by the chef. We were called out at one of the shows in the theatre to make sure we “planned” on attending the Marriage show/newlywed show as they wanted to make sure we were on stage for the show. (That’s a story for another day :eek:). It was so much fun!!!!

Anyway, sorry for the novel, feel free to ask any questions that may arise from reading this.

[prekteacher1]

Our daughter was married on the Pride on 12 January. It was not an embarkation wedding, but was held while in Port Canaveral. It was a smaller crowd so she was able to married in the chapel. The reception was in the Ivory Piano Bar. Roger was the pianist and was wonderful. Our hostess was Klaudia. I can't say enough great things about her. She was exceptional. The Wedding Experience ladies were okay. Pushy, but got their part of the job done. It was nice when they left. The whole experience couldn't have gone any smoother. I hope Klaudia is still there when you get married. Let me know if you have other questions. The chef added flowers and ribbon to the cake that we brought along. It was beautiful!

[VM_Mom]

Hi everyone! Im getting married on the Carnival Pride out of Baltimore on May 15, 2011. Can anyone give me any reviews, advice or just a few tips just to help me make my day as stress free as possible.

 

I was married on the Legend, which is, I think, a sister ship. It was wonderful. It was rainy on our embarkation day so we had no outside photos :( but our photographer found all sorts of amazing indoor shots.

 

One of the other fellow brides mentioned in another forum - don't sweat the details. There were a few little things that went wrong, but overall it was wonderful. It's your day - your celebration of your love .. .Enjoy! ;)

[sassy_1782]

I'm getting married in just over 3 weeks on the pride on the day of embarkation. We've got 22 people, so should be in the chapel, but I haven't gotten the call yet and probably won't for another week. So far planning has been super easy, but we are keeping it simple. Your coordinator should be from A Wedding for You. I called them right after I booked to find out what they did. At that time they said they said they handle all ceremony stuff and that we talk closer to the wedding. She called me about 2 weeks ago, but we didn't connect and she was out of town for a week. Luckily I'm not planning an additions to the ceremony and I made my own silk flowers for everyone. All I had to do was fill out the checklist carnival emailed me in the beginning and let the coordinator know who I wanted to walk down the aisle first. I'm sure if you have more change/details, you'll be in touch more often.

 

As for the reception I also booked the 1 hr with a DJ. That will probably be in the Beauties Dance club, not my favorite decor, but if you want the DJ you have it in the dance club. I'm bringing my own cake topper, a burned cd with entrance, first dance and father/daughter dance songs & personalized bev napkins. Granted Carnival said original CDs but from everything I've read they'll play a burned cd. After that it'll be the billboard top 40 radio songs according to Carnival.

 

I plan on posting with pics and such when I get back. When I first joined the board, I couldn't find a thing about the Pride. And in the last month, alot of people have been asking questions about it.

[Tiffany1203]

I'm getting married in just over 3 weeks on the pride on the day of embarkation. We've got 22 people, so should be in the chapel, but I haven't gotten the call yet and probably won't for another week. So far planning has been super easy, but we are keeping it simple. Your coordinator should be from A Wedding for You. I called them right after I booked to find out what they did. At that time they said they said they handle all ceremony stuff and that we talk closer to the wedding. She called me about 2 weeks ago, but we didn't connect and she was out of town for a week. Luckily I'm not planning an additions to the ceremony and I made my own silk flowers for everyone. All I had to do was fill out the checklist carnival emailed me in the beginning and let the coordinator know who I wanted to walk down the aisle first. I'm sure if you have more change/details, you'll be in touch more often.

 

As for the reception I also booked the 1 hr with a DJ. That will probably be in the Beauties Dance club, not my favorite decor, but if you want the DJ you have it in the dance club. I'm bringing my own cake topper, a burned cd with entrance, first dance and father/daughter dance songs & personalized bev napkins. Granted Carnival said original CDs but from everything I've read they'll play a burned cd. After that it'll be the billboard top 40 radio songs according to Carnival.

 

I plan on posting with pics and such when I get back. When I first joined the board, I couldn't find a thing about the Pride. And in the last month, alot of people have been asking questions about it.

 

I cant wait to hear about your review and see your pictures!! CONGRATS!!!