Honeymoon: When to book, and how much did YOU spend?

@Jae - that sounds cheap for Italy including plane fare for two -- are you staying in hotels or an apartment?

Were looking to go to somewhere all inclusive for a week after the wedding, budgeting approx $4000 and then Portugal for 2 weeks in August (FH grew up there and his parents have a house) were budgeting $4000 for that as well.

I am hoping to book Portugal soon as the flights are a great deal and hoping the prices for the AI go down a bit.

We are staying at Sandals La Toc for 10 days in May for $9,700 (we're getting the second highest room category) and that price is 10% off with FH military discount. I found our flights for $1,100 total because I used my airline miles to get one ticket for free. We booked about 6 months out. We will never spend this much on a trip again so it better be worth it!! LOL

We booked about a month after our wedding. I didn't want to plan anymore and husband didnt have vacation left. We booked at Excellence in Punta Cana, for 7 nights, and it's just under $5k including flights and an upgraded suite (Excellence Club swim up suite). We leave Thursday...I am dying of excitement.

We booked through cheapcaribbean.com.

Recommendation: if you plan to change your name, either wait until absolutely everything is changed (passport, credit cards, all legal stuff, etc). I had all the legal stuff done, but still needed my passport and new CC was in the mail (same number, new name). When I booked, they put my maiden name on my ticket (to match my credit card), so I couldn't change my passport so they can match. It was pure laziness that I hadn't already put my passport in the mail which saved me. You cannot change the name on the ticket. If you go right away after the wedding, this won't be an issue though!

Erin, we booked with a travel agent but this is the tour we did http://www.contiki.com/destinations/europe/tours/239-ireland, looks like it changed a bit since we did it, it was 9 days before. We had our own double bed hotel room each night as well. We were fortunate on our trip there were a lot of couples and another honeymoon couple as well so it wasn’t the party atmosphere you’d expect. I think this particular trip has a lot of couples, it’s more laid-back and romantic.

We are thinking of booking tonight. Through expedia we but together 1 week in Cancun at the "Sun Palace Couples Only Resort" it looks gorgeous, followed by 1 week in Playa Del Carmen at the "Gran Porto Real" which we have been to before and is AMAZING. Both are all inclusive and have SOO many things to do. Including airfare and resort costs for 2 weeks it is $5,133.60. That's a pretty amazing deal for both these places!

We booked the honeymoon FIRST. Spent $2k on it, ended up spending $3k in spending while on HM.

We haven't booked our honeymoon yet, but we've been to Mexico. We did 10 nights at Iberostar Tucan in Playa del Carmen. $1,600 per person, including airfare. We booked through Apple Vacations and LOVED our trip!

@Julie hotels, we picked mostly 3 star hotels in downtown areas that were on the lower price range (Rome, Florence, and Venice). All had good reviews though on TripAdvisor. We didn't care about having luxury places to stay as we plan to spend most of our time exploring Italy! That helped keep cost down A LOT

@Emily, which resort did you go with in Jamaica? And do you mind sharing what room option you chose?

8 nights in Sorrento, Italy which is going to be probably a bit above 2000 Euro. We managed to get really good deals on flights (from Europe) and a good deal on the hotel.

I always get my cheapest vacations 1-2 months prior to departure.