November 9, 2020

Rocky Mountain Elopement- Cheyenne & Brennan

Making the Most of Colorado's 2nd Largest Wildfire in History

What a WHIRLWIND this day was!

Cheyenne, Brennan and I planned to meet at Rocky Mountain National Park for their beautiful elopement, but life had other plans.

On October 22nd, 2020, The East Troublesome Fire broke out and caused a forced evacuation of Estes Park and the surrounding areas. RMNP was closed. I discovered this as Thomas and I were on the road to Estes Park while I was looking up shuttle routes for the park. My jaw dropped. What were we doing to do so last minute?!

I quickly let Cheyenne know that the park was closed and we'd have to start finding other options. I spent the remainder of the drive researching day hikes besides RMNP near Denver, and hotels to stay at since our hotel in Estes Park was being evacuated (The receptionist answered the phone in a panic and said "Is this an emergency?! The hotel is evacuating....Thomas answered, "Well yes, that's we're calling, we had a reservation for today...". " Yes, don't come up here! Someone will contact you later to work out your refund.")

Cheyenne found Silver Dollar Lake Trail and I thought it'd be a gorgeous alternative so we settled on that as the plan for Friday. Meanwhile, Thomas and I checked in at Ameristar Resort & Casino in Blackhawk, Colorado. We called and they said they had no rooms available, however when we checked online and luckily there were 2 left. This actually made our drive from Lubbock shorter by an hour which was great! We got to play some slots, Black Jack and Poker. We won like $300 on the slots (my first time winning at a Casino ever!) but it was promptly lost the next day (wamp wamp wamp) but we had a wonderful time nonetheless. We woke up the next morning to frost covered mountains. The earth felt still, like the entire world was sleeping. We ventured onto the hotel rooftop with our Pumpkin Spice Lattes in hand to take in the falling snow in the 15* (!!!) weather. Cheyenne messaged me that morning saying a cold front had unexpectedly blown in overnight and the roads where they were staying in Aurora were frozen. We thought that might make the hour and a half trip to Silver Dollar Trail tricky, so we began to search for other options. Finally, we settled on St. Mary's Glacier. It was rated as a moderate hike that was only half a mile each way, and the views were stunning! The plan was set, so Thomas and I spent the remainder of the morning and early afternoon playing more slots and table Texas Hold 'Em together. It was time to head out around 3:30 to give us plenty of time to get there, hike to the lake with an hour of shooting time before sunset and hike back to the cars before it got too dark. For some reason, I decided to search for a Facebook page for St. Mary's Glacier ( I'm a huge research nerd, I guess.) and luckily I did because the first thing I saw on the banner of their Facebook page was that St. Mary's Glacier was closed due to the fires (!!!!!) We were literally on the road, and Cheyenne and Brennan had left as well. I messaged her and called her via Facebook immediately to let her know. We decided to just start looking for other spots, and I told her that where we were staying in Blackhawk actually had some really pretty views just straight off the highway (beautiful curvy mountain roads that go on forever). I let her know once I found a good spot, I'd send her my location. So we drove back through the town and into the mountains in the direction of the hotel. Suddenly, Thomas spotted the PERFECT spot, right off the highway. There was a BEAUTIFUL stream with rocks. Trees covered in orange and gold fall folliage. And mountains, everywhere. It was everything Cheyenne wanted. Except for the porta potties and power lines, but we worked around that! It ended up being the most beautiful day. It was 28* and freezing and poor Cheyenne nearly froze to death in her spaghetti- strap, lace-applique- layered-tulle drop-dead-gorgeous wedding dress. #worthit #anythingforthegram ;)

Watching Brennan help his soon-to-be-bride by holding her bouquet, helping her down the rocks and into her wedding attire, and fixing her dress was heart warming.

Their wedding details were some of my favorite. Beautiful white hydrangeas with red roses popped against the orange and golden autumn leaves. Their rings were simple but beautiful. Her white, studded wedding boots. His suit. Everything was just perfect.

Listening to Cheyenne try to remember the legal jargon but also not caring and making up her own on the way was the sweetest and funniest thing to witness. Self-solemnizing is so cool. I highly recommend it. A ceremony for literally just the two of you. And your photographer, if you want amazing photos. ;)

I also knew Cheyenne had found a wonderful man in Brennan as he looked over to make sure I was okay during their ceremony when I nearly face planted into the rocks. Yeah.... we weren't standing on super steady ground.

Bride & Groom portraits after the "I Do's".

Stunning mountain views.

Just married snuggles & smiles & kisses.

It doesn't get any better.

Moutain top views. Right next to the porta potties. Glorious. Still can't believe I pulled this off.

They used all possible bodily resources to keep warm (I'm dying laughing editing some of these), did bride & groom shots of peach whiskey and Brennan took a smoke break.