We went to Blue Waters Hotel to get married from 31st May to 11 June 2008. We were married on 4th June.

The hotel is excellent. We stayed in a luxury suite (406)and had sunset views across the bay. It also had a giant jet bath tub which fitted myself, my husband and my toddler in quite comfortably with overhead shower and separate shower head. We had a large patio (we were on 2nd floor) with 2 sunbeds and a table and chairs to sit 6 people. We had a separate living room with 2 large sofas, and a bedroom with a queensize bed and there was plenty of drawers and hanging space (2 wardrobes + at least 4 chest of drawers). The hotel provided a cot foc for our 2 year old on request.

We ate at all three restaurents. We were all inclusive and were very happy with choosing that option. Unlike some all inclusive options at previous hotels we have stayed at, we didn't get bored with the food, and we did not have a bad meal. We felt like we ate out at a restaurant every night, and did not feel like it was catering for the mass market, but perhaps that is because the hotel itself has an intimate feel and is a boutique style hotel.

The Palm restaurant in our opinion was excellent. Since we were AI, we mainly ate there for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Breakfast was good. English breakfast was available everyday, eggs cooked fresh by staff and to your liking (poached/easy over/scrambled/omelette, hard/soft etc etc), cereals and toast was available - bagels, muffins, croissants, danish pastries etc. Fruit and yoghurt was always available - prunes, melon, water melon, paw paw, pineapple, oranges apples, plaintain etc etc. Lunch menu was also varied, and you could get burger and chips if you so wished, turkey club sandwiches, caeser salads (chicken or prawn) and you could also help yourself to the buffet bar ( a range of salads and hot food). Vegetables in our opinion were a little crisp (when trying to satisfy a toddler), although we ourselves did not have an issue with them. The dinner menu changed every night. Some nights we ate off the a la carte menu, other nights it would be a barbeque with a buffet bar. When we ate off the menu, there was about 5 choices for each course. The meal sizes 'al a carte' in our opinion were the right size and allowed you to eat all 3 courses successfully (for the whole duration of the holiday without slowing down after a few days!). There was plenty of scallops and prawns available as well as lamb, beef, pork and chicken and vegetarian options.

The weather rained twice during the day when we were there, and a few times at night time. We were concerned about the weather before we flew out as we kept seeing 'overcast' on the forecasts. Trust me, their kind of 'overcast' is not the English type of overcast and the weather was truly fabulous and sunny all the time, but it was humid. Far more humid than we had expected. The temperature was about 30 degrees, but we stayed out of the afternoon sun everyday and went back to our room for a few hours. In the afternoon, being outside could be oppressive - at least for us anyway.

There were not loads of children there (which was fantastic), but there was a mixed age of clientele. Its a quiet relaxed place. Its not a young hip 18-30 club type of place, and we werent woken up by people up late at night drinking (evening entertainment finishes at about 11:30). We saw no bad behaviour by guests and we didn't overhear other people swearing or being rude. Thats great. Also we never overheard staff being rude to each other or to other guests. There were young couples, families,groups and older couples. Our son was treated fantastically. Everyone knew his name. All the staff spoke to him directly. They filled up his juice bottle all the time, got him sausages (when they ran out for breakfast). They knew we had taken our own cutlery for him and we occasionally left it by accident for dinner and they recognised this and would return it clean at the next meal. (This hotel does have 80+ rooms so its not that small - so this personal service is impressive - he was not the only child there) By the end of the holiday he was happy being picked up by them and was blowing kisses and dancing to the evening music. He was really well looked after.

There are 3 beaches, and you can get drink service to the beaches from the pool bars. The beaches aren't huge - some hotels have beaches a mile long. These beaches were maybe 100 yards long each, but because its low season we never fought for a chair or parasol. I imagine you would if you went when it was busy. It was easy wading out to a warm sea. There was no sudden drop in the beaches and it was safe for children. We loved them.

There are several pools. The cove suites (and pools) are 5 minutes walk away from the main hotel and quite separate really. The hotel pools are small (maybe 15m long), but this was fine. Again, we didn't have a problem getting chairs and parasols, but I think we would have done if it was busy.

Our wedding was arranged fabulously and we were really happy. The wedding coordinator (Alicia) was really really good. We had the cermony at 11a.m., lunch at 1, then we took all our guests for a helicopter ride in the afternoon and finalised the day with dinner at the Cove restaurent. We had guests coming that did not stay at the hotel and we had to pay a guest all inclusive pass for the day of approx $125 per adult and $65 per child. The hotel has got 3 photo packages. We chose the medium one for £340 and got 60 5*7's, a CD with 80 jpgs on it, 4 8*10's and a couple of keyfobs. The wedding photo's were brilliant, and they came 2 days after we were married. Be careful here because all prices I'm quoting are before tax (which you forget about until you pay the bill which is an extra 10.5%). Also if you are not all inclusive there is a 10% service charge at the restaurents, so those not pre-paid pay an extra 20.5% on top of the quoted restarent bills. We also paid for the wedding to be videoed, and got a DVD with our pictures all over the case, and personalised with our name. We liked the DVD, although we thought the advertisements at the end were innappropriate. Alicia organised the flowers for the wedding and the bride had a waterfall bouquet, we organised posies for the mothers, and button holes for both sets of parents. Our guests were dressed up (men in waistcoats and scrunchies) and we used burgundy and ivory, and the wedding coordinator got the flowers to match so we had ivory lillies and burgundy edge-sprayed roses all coordinated for everyone. We decided before we went, that the men would not wear jackets, and that was a good move as it is very hot. The hair and beauty salon provided brilliant support for the day. It is a bit concerning to go abroad and not be able to talk to a hairdresser about how you want your hair for the day, until a few days before, but those ladies in the beauty salon have got wedding hair and makeup totally sorted. The bride arranged an appointment the day before to find out what could be done with her hair and was given a book to choose the sort of updo required. There was loads of choice, and the hair looked great and stayed up all day, despite the heat and the makeup lasted as well. They are happy to use accessories (hair and makeup) that you take, or they will sort something out for you. The bride had her hair up with big rings of curls in the back. They fitted the veil and the tiara, and took it out and put another headpiece in later on the day. They also did the bride's mother's hair and makeup on the morning of the wedding. Nothing was too much trouble. The french manicure (hands and feet) also worked really well.

The helicopter ride was cool, although it takes about 40 mins to get to Jolly Beach harbour. (The roads are a bit primitive compared to England), and the helicopter can only take 6 people at a time. We tried to arrange a private charter (we had 12 people) and to get 2 helicopters at once, however, they appear not to have 2 helicopters that are the same so we would have had to pay almost double the price for all 12 people to go together (at the same time). (The second helicopter was much more expensive), so we organised two trips running back to back (one at 4 and one at 4:30) and we did not get any discounts for a group booking and paid 12 lots of the normal price.

We felt the Cove restaurant was a bit disappointing for the wedding night, as they changed their menu apparently 2 months ago, and the food is very asian/fusion oriental food. This is not great if you've got a group of people, some with simple tastes. Its all spicy with little option for non-spiced. The menu was complicated and each meal was described in a very complicated manner. It was over designed and we weren't impressed. You have to pay an excess of $25 for a 2 course meal per person and $30/5 for a 3 course meal per person (plus your service and tax - 20.5%) and we did not go back there again. It was a shame as the restarant itself was lovely and gave a totally different setting for the wedding day. This feedback was given back to the hotel, and it was nice that we could give constructive feedback and for it to be taken well. It wasn't awful, but it was dissappointing compared to the rest of the day.

The staff were brilliant on our wedding day and we were called by our married name by everyone. They gave their congratulations to us in the evening (the band played some songs) and it was made very personal. They poured champagne (french sparkling wine) all day for us and our guests as and when required.

We did not venture out much on the island or do many excursions as we had our son with us, although we did go on the eco tour for the day which we enjoyed. We went out to long island and great bird island and walked over the top of Hell's Gate which was fun. We saw star fish, pelicans, crabs, turtles, anemone and they pointed out lots of things about the habitat (coral reefs, mangroves etc) which we enjoyed incorporated into a relaxing boat trip.

Overall we had a fabulous stay and we would definately go back there again. We would recommend the hotel to anyone who does not enjoy the mass holiday market (commercial touristy type holidays), and we do feel this hotel is suitable for families, as long as the families enjoy spending time together, relaxing. This is not a place for the club med - party holiday goers who want to stay out dancing every night until the early hours.