Sandy’s Picks for the Top 10 Best Wedding Ceremony and Reception Venues on Vieques Island and Culebra Island
Happy Three King’s Day to Everybody!
Three King’s Day is a big holiday here in Puerto Rico. In fact, for adults, it’s a bigger deal than Christmas. Christmas is for children, and Three King’s Day is for the adults. So I worked this morning and took this afternoon off with friends to celebrate on the beach. I’m trying so hard to be “Sorta Rican.” Then we came home and opened presents. Yep, we exchange gifts on Three King’s Day and on Christmas down here. Pretty cool. And my husband is the best husband in the whole world! He got me a pink 5-quart Kitchen Aid mixer. If you don’t cook, you don’t get it. But if you do, you’ll understand that’s the one thing I left in storage up in DC that I’ve really regretted not bringing. And my old one isn’t pink! Wheeee!
Okay, enough bragging about my super-cool mixer and on to today’s blog entry. This is a tough one for me to write because every time I say anything nice about any specific wedding venue on this island, I take a tremendous amount of crap from the other venues that I don’t mention. The thing is, I’m not writing this blog for the vendors or villa owners here on Vieques. I don’t give a flying you-know-what what they think. I’m writing this blog for you guys — new brides and grooms who are considering getting married in Vieques or Culebra — so the opinion of a bunch of grumpy people down here who just want more business from my clients doesn’t bother me in the slightest. But I’m telling you this because I want each and every one of you to appreciate the shit I’m going to take for posting this list for you! There are literally 100 cool places you could have your wedding and reception in Vieques or Culebra. There are some restaurants that do a nice job too. But this is the list of my current favorites as we enter 2010. I’ll start in Vieques.
1) My all-time favorite wedding venue — Hacienda Tamarindo. Yes, I am biased. I got married at Hacienda. It’s a beautiful hotel that’s listed in the book “1,000 Places to Visit before You Die.” You can take over the entire hotel and have whatever events you want there for a reasonable fee. The management is fantastic, their staff are top-notch, and the breakfasts (included in the room rate) have been rated “Best in Puerto Rico” on several occasions. Bill and I consider Room #5 to be ours — it has the most amazing private patio and a view that you only wake up to in movies.
2) Martineau Belle Playa — a beautiful waterfront villa that’s part of the old Martineau resort complex. It’s three bedrooms, very posh and modern. Upscale appliances and fixtures. The porch, pool and bar cabana are perfect for wedding receptions, and you can walk right out onto the beach from the yard. The beach there is narrow and may or may not work for a beach ceremony depending on the time of year, but it’s a fabulous location for events year round.
3) Quinta Jabali — a brand-new villa located up on a hillside in La Hueca. So new the driveway was completed this fall. It’s an unusual villa in that it only has one bedroom, but it has a roof deck that is the most amazing party spot I’ve ever encountered. We’ve only done a few elopements up there so far, but we’re doing our first big wedding there on the 16th of this month and we’ve got a number of future weddings planned for that house. I think our biggest problem will be booking far enough ahead to get our hands on it because it’s that cool.
4) Caribbean Dacha — If you’ve done any searching online on Vieques, you’ve probably encountered this one. It’s a really unusual villa, positioned on a rock cliff, with a staircase down to a natural grotto that is like a private jacuzzi. The house only has three bedrooms, but it has an additional bunkhouse on the property with two more bedrooms so that it can sleep a total of 10 people. It has a fabulous pool deck for entertaining, and an enormous patio on the other side of the house that’s big enough to accommodate a large wedding ceremony and reception. Alicia Keyes stayed there when she was in Vieques to film a video on Navio Beach. The owners designed the house to mimic one of the famous dachas in Russia where they live. Everything is very oversized feeling and sort of other-worldly.
5) Punta Martineau — I think I’ve done more weddings at this villa than any other on the island because Punta Martineau boasts one of the most incredible views on the island. It’s located on the highest point along a row of posh villas and sits on a cliff, really. You have direct beach access a few houses down, but Punta Martineau commands the most enormous yard with a big infinity pool and a background of the big island a few miles across the water. When you look to the east, you can see Culebra. After dark, you can see the lights of the big island and Culebra twinkling in the background. The house is three bedrooms and the master suite is pretty unbelievable. But it’s the back yard that always takes my clients’ breath away when I’m showing them properties. You can have the wedding ceremony on one side of the yard and the wedding reception all set up and ready to go on the other side of the yard, and nobody can see the reception from the ceremony. It is awesome!
6) Evamer — always one of my favorite wedding venues, it’s right on the water with six individual units. a gorgeous pool with built in bar area and a deck that makes a perfect dance floor. They have a large concrete pad big enough to hold a seated dinner for 60 or so, but there’s more space than that if you’re being less formal. There is a grassy area next to the pool lined in palm trees that makes a beautiful area for a ceremony if you don’t want to get married on the beach out in front. The on-site property manager is fantastic and the owner’s daughter is a famous chef who handles all the event catering.
7) Villa Vista Linda — just recently available again for rentals and events, this hillside mansion is fantastic for large groups who want to stay together. The house itself sleeps something like 10 people, and then there is a casita on the pool deck that is it’s own little house. There is a mosterous kitchen upstairs, and another really cool catering kitchen downstairs, adjacent to a built-in tiki bar. The downstairs, adjacent to the pool deck, is a very large open space. The formal living parts of the house and bedrooms are upstairs. The house sits on a hillside and has a beautifully landscaped yard, with a little area just perfect for ceremony in a grove of trees. There is a beautiful view of the water from the upper floors of the property.
Hector’s by the Sea — just recently made available for larger wedding groups, this property is located directly next door to Hacienda Tamarindo, right on the water. There are three guest casitas on the property, but the best feature is a pavilion with a bar in it that the owners built for their own son’s wedding a year ago. It’s the perfect spot for smaller wedding dinners, or for larger groups, you would use that area for cocktails and dancing and put a big tent adjacent to it on the vast green lawn for your dinner tables. Hold the ceremony in the yard closest to the water and you’re sure to have the waves as sound effects.
9) Bahia Marina in Culebra — actually a huge hotel by Culebra’s standards, Bahia Maria has plenty of rooms for all of your guests, and they come configured in different numbers of bedrooms, etc. It’s not posh — it’s decorated in nice beach house style — but every room has a kitchenette, most have a great view, and they have two pools, a swim-up bar, and a two restaurants with very good food. There is a gazebo above the larger pool deck that would make for some amazing wedding photos, and the lower pool deck accommodates receptions for more than 100 people.
10) My favorite villa in Culebra is Casa Cielo — not to be confused with Casa Cielo on Vieques, a private home that is not available for events. Casa Cielo sits on top of a hill above Zoni beach, with a panoramic view of the water from every single porch on the house. The house was designed for entertaining — it only has two bedrooms. But it has tremendous wraparound porches and a greatroom with a Cathedral ceiling that just begs to be danced in. It was designed by a famous architect as his personal home, and now it’s owned by a very famous author. She can only use it a few times a year so it’s available for rent. Once we got a zillion white lights on the millions of columns all around the porch, I couldn’t decide which was prettier — the villa or the magnificent view. It even has an amazing flowering tree in yard called a bridal bouquet. How perfect is that?
Alright, I did it. I gave you guys my top pics for this new year. I know there are some that have appeared before and are no longer featured — that doesn’t mean they’re not still great wedding venues. I could only choose 10 and these are my favorite 10 right now!
Finally, before I go, I gotta tell you guys a joke. A really bad one. I got it from my cousin Traci tonight — she got the joke book for her seven year old for Christmas and I think she might be regretting it now. Anyway, every day she tells me a new bad joke. And today, she and her daughter found one just for me. Permit me to share. Where does a horse stay on its honeymoon?
(imagine the Jeopardy theme here)
The bridle suite. LOL.
Until next time, happy wedding planning from Weddings in Vieques and Weddings in Culebra. Have you started planning your Caribbean destination wedding yet?
Sandy