Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, Casino Rental, Music and more!

First of all, I don't know if I already posted on this or not, but you look STUNNING!!!

I love your decision to change the top of the dress, it came out GORGEOUS!!!!

You both look amazing!!!! Those pictures are spectacular!!!!

I'm positive that lots of brides will be looking at your review for ideas. Your wedding was beautiful!!!

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, Casino Rental, Music and more!

Your pictures are amazing. Now that I read about your dress story I give you so much credit for taking that risk four days before the wedding. You DID the right thing because your dress looked absolutely beautiful on you!! CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, Casino Rental, Music and more!

WOw you looke amazing...love your dress and pictures are just awesome. you looke stunning. Congrats

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, Casino Rental, Music and more!

Amazing!
All of your touches, all of your effort shows through in every picture.

You look like an actress and I just can't place it.

I'll get back to you on that.

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, Casino Rental, Music and more!

What a fabulous review! Your Angelica pics are UN-FREAKIN-BELIEVABLE!!!!!!! I loved your fall theme and attention to detail. You and DH are so lucky to have each other!!!

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, Casino Rental, Music and more!

You and your husband look like stars. Your dress was beautiful, your shoes was sexy, and your husband was FINE!!.

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, Casino Rental, Music and more!

Your wedding was absolutely beautiful and you looked abs. gorgeous!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i love everything about it
ur hair was to die for!

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, Casino Rental, Music and more!

I just love your pics.

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

Updated with my honeymoon review (finally!)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
.•*´¯)HONEYMOON(¯`*•.

Bora Bora & Moorea HONEYMOON REVIEW

1 night at the Sofitel Tahiti: A
5 days at the LeMeridian Bora-Bora (Premium over water bungalow #329): A+
1 night Club Bali Hai Moorea (garden room 111): F-, only because there’s nothing lower
4 days at the Moorea Pearl (Beachfront Bungalow #302): A+

Sofitel in Tahiti was just a stopover – you need ot sleep somewhere before catching your interisland flights and the Sofitel is close to the airport. We were impressed by the room, it was really nice and very inexpensive. We got up early and walked around Paptee for a while. It’s not that nice there. It seemed safe enough, but it’s a city and nothing special. Although we did take a few pictures.

Tahiti, from the sofitel balcony



LeMeridian Bora-Bora: A+
Premium over water bungalow

http://www.starwoodhotels.com/lemeridien/property/overview/index.html?propertyID=1905

The only difference between an ‘overwater bungalow’ and a ‘premium over water bungalow’ is the LOCATION of the bungalow. Ours was more private and have a PERFECT view!
From our balcony


The room, there's the king size bed, then there's a couch directly accross for reading and lounging, then behind that wall is the sink area, then there's a seperate room for the shower and a seperate room for the toilet.




We took an interisland flight to the LeMeridian and the hotel provided a water taxi to the hotel. I was blown away by the water. I have never seen anything this color in my life. We were given a flower lei and a glass of juice upon arrival and had a short orientation in English and tour of the main hotel area by the manager. Most of the guests were French and Japanese, but everyone spoke English to us. We were taken by buggy to our room where our bags were already waiting. There was a bottle of champagne there waiting for us. We were completely in awe of our room. There’s a large glass floor in the room where you can look at the water, and the view of the mountain from our balcony was breathtaking. We were so in love with this room, the sitting area, the bed, the bathroom, it was all so US – very natural looking and not pretentious. We ate at the hotel each night and the food was good. I am not a big fan of eating out, so vacations are always a challenge. I am not a gourmet nor am I really into food, so I can just say the food was good & Dean loved it. We ate at the hotel every night – to me food is not a big event, I was happy to just stay at the hotel with my husband and enjoy his company. They also have a PRIVATE LAGOON for swimming with turtles and other cool fish.

Me sitting on the glass floor - the water REALLY IS THAT BLUE!!


Dean swimming UNDER the bungalow - I'm inside & took the picture - the glass distorted his size, this picture CRACKS me up - look closely, he's the same size as his shoe


Just standing on our little balcony


This is 6am, we're swimming outside our bungalow, we had the camera on the stairs and used the timer


We did the 4 x 4 excursion and were REALLY happy we did, the views from the mountains and the history you learn was great. We really enjoyed seeing the fishery where they restock the reefs, too. We felt it was a BIT too long, though, but don’t regret that we went. Again, they spoke English, but we were 3 couples, 2 English speaking and one Japanese. I spoke to the Japanese couple in Japanese a little and that was fun for me, since I don’t get to practice too often!

From the moutain tops on the 4 X 4 tour








The pool was really nice but VERY small. It was annoying because EVERYONE SMOKES and the pool area was small and we couldn't really even sit over there because of all the smoking. Because you can swim off your bungalow and they have a private lagoon there, we didn't care. If you're into a big pool, though, you won't be happy with the pool here.



Dean did a SCUBA diving tour which he said was good. He was excited to go there and see the different fish in the area. The spoke French on the trip, but that was OK for him (he owns a dive shop here in NY so he didn’t need instruction) I don’t know if they spoke English or not, he didn’t try.

I used the spa service there for a manicure but was not impressed. The manicurist spoke only French, ZERO English and I wanted to tell her something and I couldn’t. She did an OK job on my nails, but I didn’t feel pampered. ALL she did was remove the old polish and apply new, NOTHING else, no like hand massage or wax or lotion or anything. I thought it was a waste of $$.

They have their very own turtle sanctuary there and it was really cool to get to snorkel with the turtles!





I loved the LeMeridian, it was gorgeous. The grounds were beautiful, the VIEW was amazing, the water was perfect, we loved the room - we would definitely stay here again.

Sunset


THIS IS AT NIGHT!! We used the night setting on the camera - THIS IS THE MOON!!
this is over the 'private lagoon'
















We were supposed to have a direct flight from Bora Bora to Moorea. For some reason we were sent to Tahiti. Then we waited in an airplane hangar for OVER AN HOUR for our bags. Then we went to the line to wait for our flight to Moorea. After waiting another HOUR we were told that the flight we were supposed to be on from Bora Bora to Moorea had gotten cancelled (we kinda figured that out when we landed in Tahiti) and now we needed to WALK to the NEXT BUILDING to get a flight to Moorea (not that far unless you’re CARRYING ALL YOUR LUGGAGE, in which case, it IS pretty damm far!!) We were at the end of the line because Dean had used the rest room right when they told us to go to the next building, so we got in line (all EIGHTY of us) and got a number. There was a 20 seater plane to bring us to Moorea. YES- we were #77 & 78 so we had to wait for the FOURTH trip over. We basically lost almost an ENTIRE day in the *&^#%$ Tahiti airport. So we land in Moorea and we’re not too happy & pretty damn tired.

CLUB BALI HAI GETS A HUUUGE "F" – IT WAS AWFUL!
(don’t even take my word for it, go to trip advisor, read the other reviews, too!!) We regret that we didn"t take any pics to show how bad it was there!

We were given an RCI exchange to the Club Bali Hai in Moorea (Cooks Bay area) as part of our wedding gift from my father. We wanted to go to Bora-Bora and Moorea and thought it would be perfect. We could stay at our dream hotel in Bora-Bora and then stay at the Club Bali Hai at no expense to us. We wouldn’t have even DONE this trip to Bora Bora & Moorea without this because it was SO EXPENSIVE. We got to the Club Bali Hai after a long trip and the part of Moorea it was in didn't look that nice to me. I wasn't 'blown away' by the view like I thought I'd be - the water didn't look clear AT ALL to me and not at ALL like I was in an exotic place, it looked like the Atlantic Ocean here in New York. It was that dark green/blue color, not like an exotic place should be. I didn’t even realize we were at the hotel because there wasn’t like any fancy entrance to it or anything, it was just RIGHT on the road.

After meeting Rosie at the front desk, we were immediately told to have a seat in the open air lobby and meet with Robert who was going to give us a little 'orientation' of sorts. He was speaking for a few minutes, but it was all stuff I had already read on Trip Advisor already about local restaurants & convenience stores, so I just looked over at my tired husband and rubbed his arm, Robert saw me and took this as 'I am not interested' and said "You can just go to your room if you don't want this information"

So apparently one must RAPTLY listen without movement or you are dismissed. Anyway, we get up, the cushion on the 1970's wicker chairs STUCK to my husbands butt! He pulled it off - there was GUM on it (and on his butt now!!) ...and it was downhill from there.

There is no beach to speak of at all, there’s maybe 15 feet of beach but all the kayaks are parked there and the water looked so skeevy to me I wouldn’t have gone in it anyway. The pool was small and old looking - nothing great, the grounds are OK, but all hotel gardens look pretty to me, there was nothing special about it (except all the chickens roaming around, THAT I'd never seen before). We had a 2nd floor garden/mountain view room. We walked up the steps, and it smells like cat pee outside, probably because there were kittens on the roof that you can hear in the room because the door is a paper thin hollow core. We walked in and were SLAMMED in the face by the STENCH of MILDEW. I have ALLERGIES to mildew - It was so intense my husband was like "WHAT is that SMELL??" I said "MILDEW" - The bathroom smelled worse, but different, more like 'stale bad breath' than mildew.

The furnishings and entire room were CLEARLY from 1970 and NOT updated, the kitchenette, and bathroom were OLD. It seemed clean, that's the only positive I can say. We were given a plastic card attached to the key and told when we left to remove the card so that the power would turn off when you were not in the room, meaning: if you're out the A/C is off.

I stepped onto the balcony (where there was a plastic lounge chair) to see this incredible view everyone raves about - there was a HUGE tree obscuring about 3/4 of the view and honestly, the view is of a mountain, the whole island has mountains, it's not THAT breathtaking if you've ever traveled ANYWHERE before - we had just left Bora Bora where we had the most breathtaking view I have ever seen, and we were in Costa Rica in April, and that has much BETTER mountain/ocean views! The water is DARK – it looks like the atlantic ocean to me. I was SO disappointed

I said to Dean "I can't stay here" I went to the front desk and said "Can I pay for a better room?” Rosie said "I GAVE you a better room!" I said "You're kidding, right?"
She said "We're all full." So I went back up to the room like 'dead man walking'. We walked to the convenience store and I didn't feel like we were in a 'nice' area of Moorea. I was scared there were people everywhere with dead fish hanging outside their little stands and there were no sidewalks so we were walking in the road. I really just wanted to cry. We got back to the room and we were just reading in bed.

There were these strange spliced wires hanging on each side of the bed that controlled the lamp. My husband was sure he was going to be electrocuted. I was so terrified because of HOW THIN the door was, I made my husband push the dresser in front of the door. Our door faced the road and you could hear the traffic and the roosters clearly.

At like 4am I look over at my husband. He looks at me and says “We CAN NOT stay here another night.” He couldn’t sleep at all that night because the bed was SO UNCOMFORTABLE. At 7am I went to the front desk (I DIDN’T CALL BECAUSE THERE ARE NO PHONES IN ANY OF THE ROOMS) and ask what time Avis opens. I was told 8am. So we sat there and waited for Avis to open so that we could rent a car and find another hotel to stay at.

We drove to EVERY HOTEL. The Sheraton & Intercontinental were booked, the Sofitel was closed for renovations, the club med was closed down, so our LAST TRY was the Moorea Pearl. The only had ONE ROOM left in the hotel, a Beach Bungalow suite, we said “WE’LL TAKE IT!!!!!!”. It was room 302, right next to the dive shop, which, since Dean owns a dive shop here, made us feel right at home! So we were supposed to stay at the Bali Hai and COULD NOT EVEN STAY THERE. It was such a dive. So our trip wound up costing WAAAAAAAY more than we expected.

Moorea Pearl Resort – A+
The Pearl was GORGEOUS!!!!!!!!! We got there and felt SO MUCH BETTER. We felt like we were on our honeymoon again.





The Club Bali Hai made us feel like we were trailer trash. We got to the Pearl and just were in awe of the beautiful room, the gorgeous view, the immaculate grounds, and the beach. We went snorkeling RIGHT outside our door. We swam maybe 10 feet and there was like a 20 foot DROP – a CORAL REEF!!!!! It was GORGEOUS!!!! We had the most amazing snorkeling right outside our door!! Dean saw an octopus which was the only really ‘strange’ thing we saw, but all the fish were just amazing, butterfly fish, Moorish idols, triggers, cardinal fish, puffer fish… I can’t even remember all of them! When we got back the staff at the Pearl brought us a bottle of champagne. We were in Heaven again!!

I used the spa twice there for massages. They were SO GOOD. I totally felt pampered and felt I got what I paid for.

The pool here is nice, very big & there's a jacuzzi part to it also.



This is our bungalow from the outside


Our next door neighbor, the dive shop


Me laying on the beach outside our bungalow


We ate at several different restaurants while on Moorea. We ate at Alfredo’s because everyone raves about it. I was not impressed. The food was OK, but in my opinion EVERY MENU ON THE ENTIRE ISLAND IS ALMOST EXACTLY THE SAME!!! We ate at the hotel once and that was OK, but they messed up my order twice and I had to send it back.

We ate at Le Sud three times, I liked it there. The food was a bit better than at the other places on the island. If I had to pick a place, I’d say Le Sud had the best food in all our stay in French Polynesia.
This is a little description & pics of Le Sud from club bali hai’s website
http://www.clubbalihai.com/restaurant_le_sud_in_tahiti.html ]restaurant_le_sud_in_moorea[/L]

Dean did 4 dives with Moorea Fun Dive. He had checked out several dive shops before we left for there and he really liked their program, they’re an American place, most of the others are French, so the equipment was more like he was used to using. He really liked diving with them.
http://www.moorea-fundive.com/

We have about 300 underwater pictures - I'll spare you most of them










Do you see the stone fish here???


These were NOT shark dives, there's just a lot of sharks around


















The pink thing is a sea anemone - the clown fish hide in them



We didn't take a tour here, but we rented a car and drove around the island a bit. There's only ONE road around the island, so you can't get lost.


It's cloudy a lot.






We had decided before we even got engaged to get tattoos while in French Polynesia. I have many, but it was going to be Dean’s first. We did extensive research and decided on using James at Moorea Tattoo – located at the intercontinental resort. We TOTALLY loved James. He designed unique tattoos for both of us based on our ideas. He does not have a lot of books out because he wants to create a unique look for each person. He has been tattooing for many years and had a totally clean shop, like I am used to seeing in NY, individual ink, new needs, gloves, everything one use as it should be.
http://www.mooreatattoo.com/

Jame's wife is a Tahitian travel agent and can arrange your interisland flights or your whole vacation if you want
http://www.truetahitivacation.com/



This was the sunset from our little balcony at the Pearl

Message edited 1/25/2007 9:27:06 PM.

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

WoW your pics came out amazing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

your review was wonderful, thank u so much. u are so gorgeous!

as for the bali hai- i wish i had known you were going there, we met people that stayed there and we even stopped there to chat with them and i remember that distinct smell of mildew.

i'm sorry you had such a bad experience there, but thankfully it didnt ruin your trip!

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

I wanna go there!!! So beautiful!!!

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

Awesome review!! Great pictures!! And the Honeymoon looked sooo beautiful! Congratulations

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

WOW...love your HM pics Kara!

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

Kara u got some amazing pics!! i never thought to do that, use the timer on the camera to get shots of u together! i love the last one of u a dean its like the sunset in the backround and u two a little darken out. awesome pic!! ur making me wanna go!!! glad u had a great time!!!!

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

OMG!!! This was an awesome review. I loved everything about your wedding. The shoes were just too cute too.

I would love to check out your officiant, he sounds amazing. I'll FM you for the details. I loved your day after pics. This was a nice touch.

Congrats!!!!

Suzanne

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

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Posted by angnick

as for the bali hai- i wish i had known you were going there, we met people that stayed there and we even stopped there to chat with them and i remember that distinct smell of mildew.

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Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

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Posted by SuzArtie69

OMG!!! This was an awesome review. I loved everything about your wedding. The shoes were just too cute too.

I would love to check out your officiant, he sounds amazing. I'll FM you for the details. I loved your day after pics. This was a nice touch.

Congrats!!!!

Suzanne

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Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

that was an amazing review. Because I travel for my job every month and I'm always flying, I was really against going so far away for my honeymoon, but I think your review just convinced me to go to French Polynesia! It looks like the most romantic, beautiful, relaxing place. You are a gorgeous couple and I wish you all the best.

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

What an amazing wedding. Your pictures are awesome.

Thanks for sharing

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

i love love love your review! i love looking at your pics!
looks like you had a dream wedding and hm!!
congrats!

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

I am amazed by the details of your wedding! I was just engaged and we are into details also.

PS....
The shoes are awsome, as is Angelica Glass

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

OMG! Everytime I look at ur pics I get goosebumps!!! I love it...you guys are so friggin rockin...the shoes totally make it!!!

Plus your honeymoon is like a fantasy!!!

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass (day after shoot), Tommy's Tunes, Mia from b-Iounge, and more! UPDATED with honeymoon!

amazing review! Thank You

Re: A very Kitty Wedding 10/1/06: Tall Grass CC, Golden Moments, Port Jeff Florist, Maria D'Leon, Angelica Glass Day After Shoot, Tommy's Tunes, & more! UPDATED with honeymoon on page 4!

is it bad that i look at your pictures atleast once every other week and hope that my wedding is half as beautiful?