Sunset Elopement at Dream Lake

Colorado Elopement Videography Highlight Film

Rocky Mountain National Park Elopement

Katherine + Alex

If you ask us, every elopement should include at least one dog. We think Katherine and Alex would agree. When they first contacted us about being their elopement photographers + videographers, they told us that they were most excited to spend the day with the people they love most in the world: each other (duh), but more importantly their dogs, Dink and Waffles.

Katherine and Alex met while in college in Nebraska and spent their first evening together at the park with Katherine’s dog, Dink. And on their first official date at a hole-in-the-wall Ethiopian restaurant, Katherine realized that maybe Alex was the one she wanted to adventure with. Since then, they spent time long distance while Katherine moved around for her research, and were finally able to settle in Upstate New York together, where they adopted a second dog, Waffles.

For their elopement, they knew that they wanted to come to Colorado. The imagined their ceremony being in the mountains and surrounded by trees (and of course their dogs). After we sent over their location recommendations, they fell in love with Rocky Mountain National Park, particularly Hidden Valley for their ceremony as well as the hike to Dream Lake. Unfortunately, though, RMNP doesn’t allow dogs outside of their picnic areas, campgrounds, or parking areas. So while Hidden Valley perfectly fit their forest vision, it just wasn’t going to work. So we searched high and low for a forested ceremony spot outside of the park that would allow them to have their ceremony with their dogs. Then we would drop the dogs off at their accommodation before heading into RMNP for their sunset hiking adventure!

Things were all going as planned until the pandemic broke out. Like so many other couples, they found their wedding teetering on the edge of possibility. We agreed to hold out and reconvene at the end of April to make the final decision. But by then, RMNP had closed for visitors and travel was not seeming likely. But Katherine and Alex kept their cool, we set up an alternate date later in the summer, and held out hope that things would re-open by the time their wedding day came. And we’re so glad we did! Estes Park opened up for visitors and RMNP started their phased re-opening just in time! Getting married during a pandemic is a little strange, but Katherine quickly became even more appreciative that her wedding dress had pockets because they conveniently held her face mask.

On the afternoon of their wedding, we met them at the trailhead and hiked out to their forest ceremony site. Throughout quarantine, Katherine and Alex taught Waffles how to be Alex’s best man, and taught Dink to walk Katherine down the aisle and sit patiently on the train of her wedding dress. And we are here to confirm that Waffles and Dink did SO well! Waffles even gave Alex a little look of support as Katherine walked in.

After the ceremony, Katherine and Alex danced to “Home” by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes. Originally, they planned to take dance lessons, but those plans were squashed by the pandemic. But even on the uneven ground, they pulled off an adorable first dance!

We ended the evening by hiking up to Dream Lake in Rocky Mountain National Park. It was later in the day, so most people were hiking down and we had the place almost to ourselves. They climbed up onto the top of the rock and watched as the last little bit of sun tucked beneath the rocky cliffs. Once we had soaked up enough of the mountain air, and views, we hiked back down to the trailhead, talking about our future travels along the way. We ended the evening as the sun officially set and the sky was filled with the most beautiful oranges, purples, and pinks.

“Lisa and Alex go so far beyond photographers and videographers. My husband and I didn’t stress about our wedding at all due to the level of experience and calming presence that Lisa and Alex bring. As a Type A person, I can’t oversell how wonderful it was to have incredibly talented and capable people handling everything. It is obvious how much passion Lisa and Alex have for their work and couples, and the amount they care shows through in everything they do. They provided invaluable help planning our wedding and were incredibly detail oriented. They listened to everything we said and implemented our requests seamlessly into the day.

Their images were true works of art and I have never seen wedding pictures and videos of this quality before. Their work was one of our inspirations for eloping, and we are so happy we chose them to capture our day. As an unphotogenic person, I was shocked that I loved all their photos. The highlight video they produced made the people that couldn’t be at our wedding feel as though they were a part of our day, brought me to tears, and gave us the ability to relive our day. My husband and I never felt uncomfortable being ourselves in front of Lisa and Alex, and we truly felt as though we were friends by the end of our wedding. You will not regret prioritizing photography and videography quality by hiring Vow of the Wild. Our wedding day couldn’t have been more perfect, and Lisa and Alex were a main component of that.”

— Katherine + Alex

This elopement took place on Ute, Cheyenne, and Arapaho Land.

Photographs

Colorado Elopements

Destination Elopements

Hi There!

We're Lisa + Alex, the goofballs behind Vow of the Wild. We live in Colorado, but we’re passionate about exploring new places. Being elopement photographers + videographers is a dream for us and we can’t imagine doing anything else (other than being professional dog petters).