Dream wedding to holiday nightmare

howardkc

Hi my partner and i have booked our dream wedding at the Smugglers Cove Resort in St Lucia for August 2015, two weeks including the wedding ceremony, fabulous a dream come true. However we have recently discovered on the internet that the Smugglers Cove St Luica is now being demolished in April 2015 so our dream is now a nightmare! We have paid a deposit of £475 and we have had a call from Virgin holidays to say that we will not be able to have our wedding in Smugglers Cove now and they will look into finding us an alternative. We took great care in choosing the place of our dream wedding and now it seems we will have to get married in another place we have no choice in. Also the trip was going to cost around £4500 in the sales, now the sales are over we have looked and they are around £7000!!!! for similar weddings at St. Lucia.
We feel that Virgin should have advised us at the time that the resort was pending rebuilding and we have been mislead.
We are devastated and are wondering if anyone else is in the same position.
Help us Martin what should we do?

jpsartre

You have only been mislead if Virgin sold you the holiday knowing that the resort would be unavailable. They should offer you the choice between a suitable alternative and a full refund. Not sure what else you expect or are looking for, it's not like Virgin can pull some strings to postpone the demolishment!

littlereddevil

Take your money back and look elsewhere.

BJV

I know that at the moment it feels as though the world is closing in. We booked our honeymoon in the Maldives' and because of a terrorist act it was cut short by 3 days.


It is years on now and I sometimes get annoyed thinking how much pressure I put myself under to have the perfect day. The perfect wedding. The money it cost OMG!!! I do not want to think but I can honestly say it will not matter in the long run. It is who you are getting married to that counts not where. You will find somewhere and I bet it will be even better.


Don't panic just shop around. In fairness and I know it would make it easier to have someone to blame or account to but Virgin may have only just found out. I doubt that they would of wanted to waste the time taking bookings and all the extra staffing costs trying to swap you to something else if they knew.


Good luck. I really hope you find somewhere.


PS Maldives Coco Palm is amazing!!! In fact anywhere in the Maldives so might be a good alternative.

howardkc

We will take on board your advice and look at the Maldives thank you

chancesare_2

I have a home in St Lucia, I would not be going there in August for anything let alone a dream wedding. Whilst you can't guarantee the weather anywhere, when it rains in St Lucia, it really rains. August is slap bang in the middle of the rainy (hurricane) season.

Do some research before you commit to anything else.

tori.k

Chancsare make a good point, we got married in Mauritius a tropical hurricane put an end to the just the two of us beach wedding we had planned as it ended up in the hotel foyer self service restaurant with the rest of the hotel guests.