The Ultimate Guide to Planning a Destination Elopement
Everything You Need to Know Before You Say "I Do" Somewhere Extraordinary
There are weddings that happen in a venue.
And then there are weddings that become part of the landscape itself.
The kind where the day begins before sunrise, hiking through quiet mountains with coffee tucked into your backpack. Where vows are exchanged beneath towering sandstone cliffs in Zion National Park, beside an alpine lake in Colorado, or overlooking the sea somewhere you've always dreamed of visiting together. Where there isn't a ballroom waiting at the end of the day, only another adventure.
That's what a destination elopement is.
It's choosing an experience over a schedule.
A place over a production.
A story that feels unmistakably yours.
As a Southern California destination elopement photographer based in Oceanside, California, I've photographed intimate weddings and adventure elopements across the American Southwest, Mexico, the Rocky Mountains, and throughout Europe. Whether I'm documenting couples exchanging vows in Yosemite National Park, exploring the mountains of Colorado, wandering the streets of Florence, shuffling through sand on a Mexico beach, or even creating an unique day surrounding an intimate courthouse elopement, I've learned that no two destination elopements ever look the same.
And they shouldn't.
The most meaningful destination weddings aren't built around Pinterest checklists or rigid timelines. They're built around who you are as a couple, what places inspire you, and how you want to remember this chapter of your lives.
Maybe that means reading letters together inside a quiet cabin before the sun comes up.
Maybe it's sharing a bottle of wine after your ceremony while watching the light disappear behind the mountains.
Maybe it's inviting ten of your closest people to celebrate with you before slipping away for portraits beneath the stars.
Or maybe it's just the two of you.
However your day unfolds, your destination elopement should feel intentional, not rushed. Personal, not performative. An experience you lived first, and photographs you treasure because of it.
This guide is here to help you plan exactly that.
Whether you're just beginning to explore the idea of an adventure elopement, dreaming about a national park wedding, or already planning a destination wedding somewhere halfway around the world, you'll find everything you need to create an experience that feels authentic to you, from choosing the perfect location and building your timeline to wardrobe, permits, travel logistics, and making the most of every moment.
Because the best destination elopements aren't remembered for how perfectly they followed a timeline.
They're remembered for how they felt.
Why More Couples Are Choosing Destination Elopements
Weddings are changing. Not because tradition no longer matters, but because couples are becoming more intentional about which traditions actually matter to them.
For a long time, planning a wedding often meant beginning with everyone else. How many people do we need to invite? Where will everyone sit? What will our families expect? What are we supposed to do?
More couples are starting somewhere else entirely:
How do we actually want to spend the day we get married?
And sometimes the answer is hiking through the mountains before sunrise. Drinking coffee together at a cabin before getting ready. Exchanging vows somewhere you've dreamed about visiting for years. Sharing dinner with ten of your favorite people. Or disappearing somewhere beautiful with nobody else there at all.
A destination elopement shifts the focus away from hosting an event and back toward experiencing the day with your person.
We're Putting More Value on Experiences
I think this goes far beyond weddings.
We're living in a time when people are placing more value on experiences, the trip you've always wanted to take, the places you want to see, the things you want to do while you're here.
It makes sense that weddings would begin to reflect that, too.
Instead of putting the entire budget toward one traditional event, couples can choose to invest in an experience: an incredible place to stay, a private chef after their ceremony, a week exploring a new country, an adventure they've always wanted to take, or photography that documents the entire thing as it unfold.
And depending on how you plan it, an intimate destination wedding or adventure elopement can also cost significantly less than a traditional wedding. You're no longer automatically paying to feed, seat, entertain, decorate for, and accommodate a large guest list. You get to decide where your money actually matters to you.
That doesn't mean an elopement has to be inexpensive. You can make it beautifully simple or wildly immersive. The difference is that you decide where the investment goes.
Your Wedding Can Actually Feel Like You
Ultimately, I think that's what all of this comes down to.
A destination elopement gives you the freedom to remove the things you're doing because you feel obligated to do them and make more room for the things that actually mean something.
You can still invite your family.
You can still wear the incredible dress.
You can still have flowers, cake, champagne, first dances, handwritten vows, or any tradition you love.
You just don't have to include anything because that's what a wedding is "supposed" to look like.
Maybe your wedding day begins with a five-mile hike. Maybe it begins with room service.
Maybe you exchange vows at sunrise and spend the rest of the day exploring. Maybe ten people are waiting afterward with champagne. Maybe no one is.
The point isn't to have a nontraditional wedding for the sake of being different.
It's to have the freedom to ask yourselves what you actually want, and then build the day around the answer.
And I think that's why so many couples are drawn to destination elopements in the first place.
They aren't running away from having a wedding.
They're choosing to make the wedding about the two people getting married.
Choosing the Perfect Destination for Your Elopement
Once you've decided that a destination elopement feels right, you get to answer one of the most exciting questions:
Where do we want to get married?
And I wouldn't start by Googling "best places to elope."
Start with the two of you.
Think about the places you're naturally drawn to. Maybe you feel most alive in the mountains. Maybe you've always pictured yourselves somewhere along the coast. Maybe you love getting lost in old cities, or you're the couple who would happily spend an entire week tucked into a cabin with nowhere to be except the on-site hot tub and campfire.
Your destination elopement location doesn't need to be the most dramatic place you can find on Instagram. It should be somewhere that either means something to you already, or gives you the opportunity to have an experience you've always wanted to share.
Think About the Experience Before the Scenery
Of course the photographs matter. You're probably going to want somewhere beautiful.
But before choosing a destination based entirely on how it looks, think about what you want to do there.
Do you want to wake up before sunrise and hike to your ceremony location?
Would you rather spend the morning slowly getting ready at an incredible Airbnb before driving somewhere beautiful for your vows?
Do you imagine exploring throughout the day, moving between several landscapes?
Do you want dinner at an amazing restaurant afterward?
Are you bringing family?
Do you want complete privacy?
Would you rather be barefoot on a beach or bundled up somewhere in the mountains?
Do you want to charter a sailboat?
Do you want to grab rooftop cocktails overlooking a dramatic cityscape? Perhaps gelato by the Ponte Vecchio?
These answers can narrow down your options surprisingly quickly.
A couple dreaming about an adventurous, hiking-centered national park elopement needs something very different from a couple envisioning slow mornings, incredible food, and wandering through an old European city.
Neither experience is better.
They're simply different stories.
Consider What the Location Will Actually Be Like on Your Wedding Day
Once you've fallen in love with a destination, this is where the less glamorous (but very important) research begins.
A location that looks completely secluded in a photograph may have hundreds of visitors standing just outside the frame.
That incredible mountain road might still be covered in snow in May.
A desert location can be beautiful in October and dangerously hot in July.
A beach may almost disappear at high tide.
Some national parks require ceremony permits, restrict where weddings can take place, limit group sizes, or have specific rules surrounding photography, florals, décor, and amplified sound.
When we're planning a destination or adventure elopement, I'm thinking about more than whether a location photographs beautifully. I'm considering things like:
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season and typical weather
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sunrise and sunset times
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crowds and privacy
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trail difficulty and accessibility
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driving time between locations
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permits and ceremony restrictions
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where you're staying
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where you'll eat afterward
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backup locations
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how the light moves through the landscape
These little details can completely change how the day feels.
Privacy Might Mean Doing Things Differently
If exchanging vows privately is important to you, sometimes the answer isn't finding a secret location.
It's choosing a different time.
Sunrise can transform an otherwise busy destination. Weekdays are often quieter than weekends. Shoulder seasons can offer beautiful conditions without peak-season crowds.
And sometimes we can intentionally separate parts of the experience.
Maybe we explore a popular overlook together when the light is beautiful, but you exchange your actual vows somewhere quieter.
Your ceremony location and your favorite portrait location don't necessarily have to be the same place.
That's one of the advantages of building an adventure elopement timeline around the experience rather than trying to squeeze everything into a traditional wedding-day structure.
Let the Location Be Part of the Story
Ultimately, I want your destination to do more than give us a beautiful backdrop.
I want you to experience it.
If we're in Colorado, let's spend time in the mountains instead of driving to an overlook, taking photographs for twenty minutes, and leaving.
If you're planning a Yosemite National Park elopement, let's give ourselves enough time to explore the valley, watch the light move across the cliffs, stop when somewhere feels right, and actually take in where you are.
If we're traveling to Italy, I don't want every minute scheduled around photographs. I want you drinking espresso at the café downstairs. Wandering the streets. Eating pasta. Getting lost. Staying at appertivo longer than we planned because the spritz's are cold and delicious and nobody wants to leave.
Those things aren't taking time away from your elopement photographs.
Those are your elopement photographs.
The destination becomes meaningful because you lived something there.
So when you're choosing the perfect place to elope, don't only ask:
Where would our wedding look incredible?
Ask:
Where would we want to wake up on the morning we get married?
That's usually a much better place to start.
Planning Your Destination Elopement Timeline
One of the best parts of planning a destination elopement is that your wedding day doesn't have to follow a traditional wedding timeline.
Instead of beginning with what time the ceremony should happen or how long portraits should take, I like to start somewhere else:
If no one else had an opinion, how would you actually want to spend the day you got married?
Start with the experience you want to have, and then we build your destination elopement timeline around it.
Leave Room for the Day to Unfold
Some of the best photographs happen when nothing particularly "wedding" is happening.
Getting coffee. Driving between locations. Stopping somewhere we hadn't planned. Sharing a meal. Wandering through a city with nowhere you need to be for the next hour.
That's why I intentionally leave breathing room when planning an adventure elopement timeline. Travel takes time. Light changes.
You may discover somewhere you want to explore. And sometimes you simply want to sit together for a while and take in the fact that you're getting married somewhere incredible.
More time doesn't mean more time spent posing for photographs. It means less time worrying about the clock.
Slow Elopement Day in Florence, Italy
One of my favorite examples of this was an elopement I photographed in Florence, Italy.
We didn't spend the day rushing between a checklist of famous Florence photo locations. We wandered.
The couple began in elevated casual attire, slowly exploring the cobblestone streets together. We stopped for gelato. Later, aperitivo. At one point we ducked into a silent movie theater simply because we found it along the way.
Those moments became part of their Florence elopement photography because they were part of the experience, not activities staged for photographs.
The energy of the session shifted with them. We made our way toward the Arno as daylight faded, creating blue-hour portraits around the Ponte Vecchio.
The city changed throughout the evening, and so did the photographs.
The following day, they changed into their wedding attire and exchanged their vows in front of a small group of family and friends at a gorgeous villa.
That's what giving your elopement enough time allows us to do.
Your elopement should feel like a day you lived, not a photoshoot you completed.
What to Wear for a Destination Elopement
Figuring out what to wear for a destination elopement is a little different than dressing for a traditional wedding. You want to look incredible, but you also need to be able to experience the place you traveled all this way to see.
Think movement, comfort, weather, and terrain, but don't let practicality keep you from wearing something you love.
Choose Something That Moves
Movement photographs beautifully, especially against big landscapes. When choosing an adventure elopement dress or mountain elopement dress, look for fabrics and silhouettes that move with you. Flowing skirts, long trains, veils, and textured fabrics can all interact beautifully with wind and the landscape.
And don't be afraid to let the dress get a little dirty. Walk through the field. Let the hem touch the ground. You wore it to get married in.
Dress for the Adventure
If we're hiking, you don't necessarily need to hike in your wedding attire. For longer trails, we can pack everything and change when we arrive. For easier adventures, throw on hiking boots underneath your dress and let's go.
The same goes for shoes.
Bring the heels if you love them, but also bring something you can confidently walk, climb, and explore in.
For mountain elopements, layers are essential. Temperatures can change quickly, especially after sunset, so jackets, coats, warm socks, or even hidden thermals can make a huge difference.
Let the Landscape Inspire You
Consider where you're getting married without feeling like you need to dress for a theme.
A long veil catching the wind along the coast. Silk against the cobblestone streets of Italy. A dramatic train in the mountains. A classic suit against the desert.
We'll consider the landscape, weather, movement, and activities when planning your wardrobe, but ultimately, wear something that makes you feel incredible and allows you to actually live in it.
The best elopement attire doesn't just photograph beautifully.
It lets you forget about what you're wearing and experience the day.
What to Pack for Your Destination Elopement
What you pack for a destination elopement will depend heavily on where you're going and what the day actually involves. A weekend wandering through Florence requires a very different packing list than hiking through Big Bear.
That said, there are a few things that belong on almost every destination elopement packing list:
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Marriage license, permits, and identification
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Rings + vow books
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Wedding attire + accessories + garment bags
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Comfortable shoes or hiking boots
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Layers for changing temperatures
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Water + plenty of snacks
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Sunscreen
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Headlamps for sunrise, sunset, or hiking after dark
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Portable phone chargers
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Small emergency/first-aid kit
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Touch-up makeup + hair products
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Clear umbrellas if rain is possible
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Blanket for sitting, picnics, or staying warm
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Champagne or another celebratory drink
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Anything meaningful to the two of you
And don't underestimate the snacks. An eight-hour adventure on nothing but champagne is significantly less romantic than it sounds.
Your adventure elopement checklist should ultimately be built around the destination. We'll consider the weather, terrain, elevation, activities, travel, and accessibility beforehand so you aren't carrying things you don't need, or wishing you'd brought something you left at the Airbnb.
The Less Romantic Stuff That Makes the Romantic Stuff Possible
Permits and paperwork probably aren't the reason you decided to plan a destination elopement, but getting these details right gives you the freedom to enjoy everything else.
Depending on where you're getting married, you may need a ceremony permit, photography permit, parking or entry reservation, or permission to use a specific location. National Park elopements, just like the Yosemite elopement featured below, can have additional regulations surrounding ceremony locations, group sizes, décor, florals, amplified music, and photography.
Then there's the actual getting-married part.
Marriage license requirements vary depending on the state, or country, where you're getting married. Some destinations require an officiant and witnesses, while others have different options. If you're planning an international destination elopement, completing the legal marriage paperwork at home and having a symbolic ceremony abroad can sometimes simplify the process considerably.
We'll also want to consider the practical things that aren't nearly as exciting to put on a Pinterest board: trail closures, seasonal road access, parking, weather, tides, drone restrictions, Leave No Trace principles, and a solid backup plan.
I always want a Plan B.
Not because we're expecting something to go wrong, but because knowing we have another beautiful option means a little rain, road closure, or unexpected change doesn't have to derail the experience.
Permit, marriage license, and location requirements can change, so we'll research your destination during the planning process, and you'll want to verify current legal and permit requirements directly with the appropriate government or issuing authority before your elopement.
Destination Elopement FAQ
How much does a destination elopement cost?
There really isn't one number. A destination elopement can be an incredibly simple ceremony and weekend away, or it can become a multi-day international experience with incredible accommodations, private dining, florals, photography, and adventures built throughout.
One of the benefits is that you get to decide where the money matters. Instead of automatically allocating a large portion of your budget toward hosting a large guest list, you can invest in the parts of the experience that are important to the two of you.
How far in advance should we start planning our destination elopement?
For most destination elopements, I'd recommend starting around 6–12 months ahead when possible, especially if you're considering a popular National Park, international destination, or specific season.
That said, elopements can also come together much faster than traditional weddings. The fewer moving pieces you have, the more flexibility we have.
Do we need a permit to elope in a National Park?
Often, yes. Many National Parks require a special-use permit for wedding ceremonies, and individual parks may restrict where ceremonies can take place, how many people can attend, and what you can bring with you.
Moreover, many national parks are so popular during certain times of the year, a permit/registration is required for simple entry.
Always check the current requirements directly with the National Park Service for the specific park you're considering.
Can our family and friends come?
Absolutely.
An elopement doesn't have to mean secretly disappearing with nobody else there.
You can bring your parents. Your siblings. Your closest friends. Ten of your favorite people. We can even design part of the experience around your guests and reserve another portion of the day just for the two of you.
Intimate destination weddings and elopements can still include your people.
Can we bring our dog?
Sometimes. And I'm ALWAYS in favor when the location allows it.
Pet regulations vary significantly by destination, particularly within National Parks and protected wilderness areas. If including your dog is important to you, we can make that part of the location-selection process from the beginning rather than discovering later that your chosen trail doesn't allow pets.
Do you help us choose our elopement location?
Yes. You don't need to come to me knowing exactly where you're getting married.
Tell me what you're imagining, share your Pinterest inspo board, tell me about your favorite romantic film.
Mountains or ocean? City or wilderness? Hiking boots or room service? Just the two of you or your closest family? Somewhere familiar or somewhere you've never been?
We can start there and build the experience outward.
What happens if the weather is terrible?
We make a plan, and then stay flexible.
Weather is part of adventure elopement photography, and sometimes the conditions you weren't hoping for create the photographs you end up loving most.
We'll watch the forecast, create backup options when necessary, and make decisions based on safety first. A little rain or wind doesn't automatically mean your plans have to disappear.
How much photography coverage do we need?
Think less about the number of hours and more about how much of the story you want to remember.
If you want your ceremony and the time immediately surrounding it documented, The Journey may be enough.
If you want the full arc, from the quiet beginning through the ceremony, adventure, dinner, sunset, and everything that happens between, The Legacy gives us room for the day to unfold.
And if the experience spans multiple days, destinations, or celebrations, that's exactly what The Bespoke Experience was created for.
Do you travel internationally for elopements?
Absolutely. Destination and international storytelling are a huge part of what inspires me creatively.
Whether you're dreaming about wandering through Italy, exchanging vows somewhere along a rugged Scottish coastline among highland cows, or building an experience somewhere I've never photographed before, I'm happy to travel with you.
Can our elopement take place over multiple days?
Yes, and sometimes that's the best way to do it.
You don't have to squeeze welcome drinks, family time, your ceremony, an adventure, portraits, dinner, and exploring an incredible destination into one very long day.
Spread it out.
Maybe we photograph dinner with your family one evening, your ceremony the following day, and an adventure somewhere completely different the next morning.
Some experiences ask for more time. They're documented that way.
That's exactly what makes a multi-day or Bespoke destination elopement so special: instead of forcing your story into a wedding-day timeline, we allow the photography to move with it.
