We couldn't have come across Michelle and Vacations in Paradise at a more perfect time. From the very beginning we knew we wanted to do a destination wedding. After going to many sites and trying several 'online' destination wedding services, we felt more confused then helped. And since our guests were coming from all over the country we needed to find someone we could work closely with. We looked for a local travel agent who would sit down and help us find a place that worked for all of our needs, and not push a certain hotel on us. After talking to Michelle, it only took a few weeks to narrow down our choice to Moon Palace Resort in Cancun. It fit everything we wanted and we could not have been more happy. For ease, I will break down the process throughout the year: Feb 2010- Picked the Moon Palace Resort in Cancun for Jan 16 2011 wedding. We chose to do it on the Sunday of a 3 day weekend so that people would only have to take off Friday if only staying a few days. We went back and forth with Michelle confirming locations and times and signed the wedding contract. March 2010-April 2010: Sent out Save the Dates and told everyone to contact Michelle for deposit information. She took care of the deposits. She suggested the deposit be $150, since only people who are committed would put that much money down. May 2010: Michelle coordinated the deposits and helped get out the travel information. Many people started calling her regarding pricing and airfare. Throughout this time, she gave updates on who had put down deposits. June-September 2010: She continued to work closely to coordinate with the people that were booking the rooms and airfare. She also answered my hundreds of questions regarding details about Moon Palace and services they offered. If she did not know the answer, she was able to get one pretty quickly from the resort. She was able to switch around our packaged to make sure it fit what we wanted. October 2010: This was a crazy time because everyone’s money was due. As she suggested, we made the deadline about a month before the actual hotel deadline. Even so, there were still people paying several weeks after the deadline. We kept in constant contact about who still owed what and when it was all due. November 2010-December 2010: Michelle helped coordinate between the Moon Palace wedding coordinator and myself. She intervened several times to make sure we were getting the best services for the best price and kept pushing until everything was exactly how I wanted. It was extremely helpful to have her knowledge of the wedding process there, as I would not have known what was available. She also sent out several emails to the guests detailing how to travel through the airport and what to expect upon arrival. January 2011: Everyone received their documents and travel information in an organized pouch. I know everyone liked how easy it was to read and understand. Even when we arrived in Mexico, unexpected things came up and we had someone unable to come. I called her from the hotel and she was able to coordinate with the travel agency and on-site wedding coordinator to get everything figured out. Because of the pre-planning, there was not much left to figure out once we arrived in Mexico. Thanks to Michelle, and all of the planning done before the wedding, it was a breeze once we arrived. Everything went smoothly, and even the few problems that did arise were easily taken care of. She was always available by phone and answered all of my questions. There is no way I could have made travel arrangements for 44 people and have it go as smoothly as it did. Also, since she is a travel agent, she was not paid from us but from the hotel, so all of her help cost us nothing (except a giant phone bill ) We would absolutely recommend her to anyone looking to do a destination wedding as she helped make our dream come true!

Michelle at Vac. in Paradise did everything we could ask for to make our honeymoon to Sandals Emerald Bay easy to plan, affordable, and most of all, special. She worked closely with me to make changes and adjustments to our travel dates/flights, and even helped me out of a last minute (4 days before trip) bind I put myself in when I realized my passport was expired! With our wedding the 1st weekend of December, we had put a little thought into taking a honeymoon during our Christamas vacation days off, since they also corresponded with my son's days off of school. Admittedly, we only put a LITTLE thought into it, since we spent most of our time planning the wedding. So it wasn't until Thanksgiving weekend that we really got serious about planning the honeymoon, leaving us only about 3 weeks to throw something together, and Michelle was the key to making that happen. She worked with us to figure out which Sandals would fit us the best, the smartest days to travel (Sandals offers various discounts based on travel dates), as well as the best flights to book to make the trip back and forth easiest for us. Michelle even spoke with us on the phone on Thanksgiving night!! After all of our planning and quite a few emails getting stuff figured out, wouldn't you know that in the whirlwind which was our wedding planning and day, I completely overlooked that my passport had expired recently!! This was literally about 4 days before our trip. So I emailed Michelle and she immediately hooked me up with a local passport company she works with, and everything was taken care of the very next day!! That is what I call service, even in the face of my absent-mindedness. Michelle spoke with us on the phone a few days before the trip, and gave us tips, ideas, and advice for how to get the most out of our Sandals trip - and those tips really did end up being helpful. Finally, Michelle called ahead to the resort and got us an upgraded room which was beautiful and really blew us away, and we even had a surprise Honeymoon amenity waiting for us in our room when we arrived, which Michelle also requested for us without us knowing. Overall, I'd give Michelle and Vacations in Paradise a 5 star review. I'd never used a travel agent in the past, but I would not hesitate to go back through them again for our next big trip. Thank you Michelle.