Admiral Kidd Catering and Conference Center

and bay view -Great tasting food -Skyline room is nicer than 1st floor -Big dance floor -Nice bar area -You get a bridal room for only one hour prior to your ceremony Cons: -Some staff are a little difficult to work with. They are nice but are slow in responding to phone calls and e-mails. They also do not always explicitly let you know of some minor costs (i.e. $50 to have outlet for DJ, etc.) so make sure when you ask for anything see if there is a cost associated with your request. My wedding coordinator told me that a vital staff showed up 1 hour and 15 minutes late to open doors for some of the vendors. My wedding was on a Sunday and in the end it worked out but I think that is pushing it too close. -Very strict in terms of what you can use during ceremony and reception (no bubbles, real rose pedals- let me clarify, your flower girls cannot throw rose pedals during the ceremony; they charge you $200 if they find rose pedals on the ground) -they have 2 parties per day. They do not make it very clear as to which wedding is upstairs and downstairs (there was some confusion at my wedding as to where our reception was).

of the bay and San Diego skyline. However - dealing with the venue was a nightmare. Over the course of a year and a half, we were given conflicting information, assigned different catering managers and given the wrong price (almost a $2,000 difference). There were times when we could not get in touch with anyone at the venue, no one would answer our calls or e-mails. It was very frustrating. Our rehearsal was a mess because they scheduled for us to meet there when another wedding was still in progress (and another event was loading in). Fortunately everything went smoothly on the day of our wedding. The staff is friendly and means well - just really unorganized.

s.) The service leading up to the event (our catering manager could have been nicer) and service the day of was MEDIOCRE (my husband had to go into the kitchen to notify them that we were ready to cut the cake.) We had ordered 160 prime rib plates which were absolutely DELICIOUS.

that we had paid for certain things (like heat lamps) and they needed to be put out. However, for the price and views...i'll put up with bad customer service. Our wedding day was perfect and beautiful despite those occurances.

ing was more about the guests and atmosphere. The only down fall is that you only receive 2 hours set up time. This was a hassle and my family and wedding coordinator had to rush from my ceremony to get there to set up in time. I didn't like that at all but overall had a good experience.

lized tastings. They have a catering affair twice a year to taste food options. Be prepared - you have to pay for it when you attend. We did not know this but luckily had enough cash on us.

ke sure you have a credit card ready :) They were very nice and accommodating. The service was GREAT - they stayed late the day before the wedding to put everything out.

n that. I was happy with the cost of the package, it was very reasonable, when you started adding extras like lights in the reception room, it does add up so that's one thing to take into account. The only other thing was we had a tab at the bar for the bride, groom and 2 other people and some how it ended up being 480$ when in total we only had about 15 drinks and they were 5$. We are still trying ot get a list of what they said we drank and resolve that, so I wouldn't reccommend a bar tab.

little inflexible with the timing.

se their own. Not cool

o communicate with due to her delay in her responses. The average amount of time it would take for her to respond to an email was a week. I tried calling her, however she was never available to answer so I would leave her a message and it would take her at least a day to respond. It took 7 attempts to get the count correct. The last thing you want to worry about a week before the wedding is not being on the same page as your venue coordinator. Everything turned out OK, but I thought I was about to go crazy dealing with Tess the last couple of weeks.

t I could get in a 1:00 PM to decorate. The Chef was surprised to see us & even commented that he was glad he came in early. I was also disappointed that I gave a seating chart to the caterer & the tables were still set for 8 people although 8 people weren't going to be seated there. We had to rearrange the table which was a hassle since we were there to decorate & get ready! The prime rib was served w/ gravy instead of the sauce that was listed. San Diego is a very expensive place to get married that's why we chose the Subase since my husband works for the DOD & we got a great deal on it. For the price you cannot beat the view & quality of food.

t want to wait for 2-3 years to get married on a weekend night, we chose a Thursday night. It was perfect because there was not another event going on and our vendors did not have another event scheduled. The food is very reasonably priced and good. There are not private tastings but a few catering faires throughout the year, we found our DJ and our baker through the catering faire. We had prime rib and Med. chicken - and had many compliments. The venue staff is not the most helpful when you are first starting to plan but are more attentive when it gets closer to your wedding. I was not told the guests had to have an actual base pass before I sent out my invitations - it was an after thought and we had to spend more $ and time sending them out. I also was not told until the week-two before the wedding we could not decorate until 2 hours before the reception...Melissa, the coordinator did assist me with an extra hour but I was hoping to have 4-5 hours. It all worked out in the end, not all of my decorations were up how I wanted them since my family did all the decorating while we took pictures. You will not an equally nice venue for the cost and the view in San Diego, if you have someone with Military connections, definitely check out this place, my guests loved the view and the ocean breezes.

busy all day. But she usually respondded within a day or two via emails. So I mainly communicated with her through emails. That was fine with me.

le but 90% of the time any questions I had for Karen were answered within the half hour. We had 112 confirmed guests (7 people didn't show up the day of but for good reason) for the room downstairs (Harbor View Room/Patio) and a ceremony on the lawn. During the ceremony & reception most everything went as smoothly as I could have hoped. The duty manager we worked with that night whose name I unfortunately didn't learn was very good at bringing up concerns only I could deal with (e.g. continuing the open bar when we'd reached our original limit)- I learned later that my assistant/friend & bridesmaids dealt with other issues - gotta give AKC credit for knowing not to stress out the bride! The value for cost was ABSOLUTELY worth it for the view alone! The pictures that my friends & family took were gorgeous - and we still haven't seen the pro's! Any place else with the same view & similar food would have been at least 3 times as much in cost without the liquor. (BTW - the price we paid includes open bar a keg of Sierra & 2 bottles of wine at 14 tables as well as all the standard food/drink as well as the ceremony.) I went to a couple of the vendor fair/tastings and not one of the dishes really stood out but we were prepared to have satisfactory food in exchange for the view entertainment & liquor - thankfully the food turned out wonderfully! The beef dishes we tasted @ the fair weren't good at all and while we wanted to give our guests a choice between a couple dishes we couldn't let our guests eat such... sub par... food. So we ended up starting with the green salad with a spinach/parmesan stuffed chicken accompanied by scalloped potatoes and mixed veggies for the entree. For the price we paid the food was much better than any hotel wedding food I'd ever had - I was pleasantly surprised. They were pretty flexible with the decor (e.g. hanging things on the wall/from the ceilings) but they do charge a clean up fee for prohibited materials - make sure to read the fine print clearly. There is a larger room upstairs from the room we booked and thankfully no one was in it - so I can't tell you what it would be like to have 2 parties booked at the same time. The take home message is if you want a wedding on the water and if you have the proper contacts Admiral Kidd is the best choice! We visited most of the other military bases with wedding venues on the water but AKC was definitely the best. You have to figure that paying around $80/pp for the ceremony cocktail hour dinner beer wine and OPEN BAR - even it it weren't such a pretty venue - is worth it!;The chairs that AKC provides are ugly but it was worth it for us to go to a linen company to pay for chair covers. I thought the columns were going to be an annoyance but the way the tables were set up you hardly noticed them. I also thought the dance floor in the corner was going to be a hindrance but the way my DJ made the evening flow it ended up working out well. As for flexibility - it's a military base so don't expect them to bend any of the rules for you. I did ask a lot of questions about transportation & the guest list just to make sure that none of my guests got refused entrance.

I got the feeling that once the contract was signed they didn't care much about anything else after that. There was construction happening at the time of our wedding (which we found out just before our date) and the contruction debris wasn't cleaned up until after 530. Our ceremony was supposed to start at 500. If I hadn't hired a coordinator I'm sure it would have been much later than that. Had we not been bound by our contract we would have tried to find a different venue.

n. We planned our wedding while both of us were overseas so it was really great that we didn't have to think about a separate caterer.;Communication wasn't great from the catering/sales manager. I often had to wait a while for return emails. However, when I did ask questions in person they were very helpful.

o cool down. We were able to have the ceremony right downstairs on the grass in front of the water.;You have to book early! We booked 14 months in advance and there were no Saturdays available in the summer and only three Sundays to choose from. Also you'll have to book it before you've likely tried the food - so it takes a bit of a leap of faith - but the food is totally worth it for the price! Also the prices are subject to change even after you sign the contracts - but they're not out to get you! Even after we signed they were very flexible and willing to change terms to best accommodate us.

h space for all of our guests to sit indoors, as well as have an open beer/wine bar and dj inside the hall as well.;Since Admiral Kidd Club is on a military base, extra effort went in to getting my guest's date's last names since they had to show their id before they get on base. Guests were transported on the base via shuttle bus but Admiral Kidd explained everything to me in detail and there were no suprises. Guests did not complain at all about this either.

l-in-one venue. The price is great - any waterside venue in Southern California other than on a Navy base is at least twice as much!;The site manager is very difficult to work with. She was basically non-existant in our lives until the week before the wedding (it would take her over a week to return phone calls she gave us wrong information promises that were not kept). The week of the wedding she was suddently amazing and attentive - until we filled out our evaluation and then she will not return our calls about items the venue did not return to us. Get everything in writing and plan ahead because it will take a long time to get answers! Also the venue only does tastings once every six months (on a weeknight) so we had to select our menu without ever tasting the food!

rd to reach and did not attend for the entire day of event. Also moments before walking down the ailse I had requested a specific punch which they walked up and told me they would not be able to create.

downtown skyline, Coronado bridge and the San Diego Bay.;Presents are not allowed at the venue

ding day, but they are in no way an active part of it. Which means there's no site coordinator making sure stuff is going out on time. A day-of coodinator (professional or friend) is highly recommended.