Hey All,

I was wondering if anyone out there got married while on a backpacking trip. My girlfriend and I have talked about eloping but I was thinking about surprising her and having her best friend marry us on our upcoming backpacking trip in the Sierra Nevada (Rae Lakes Loop). Now I know that I can have my girls best friend get ordained online, but everywhere I read it says you must apply for a marriage license prior to the wedding, which would spoil the surprise.

Any advice or suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Well now, that's ambitious!

No reason you can't do the planned surprise ceremony then follow up with a civil ceremony afterwards to make it "legal." Heck, hit Vegas on the way home and be married by Elvis.

FWIW I know one couple who got engaged on a trek in the high Andes. Even that took some work, including lugging a bottle of wine many miles and many thousands of feet, up.

Good luck!

Yea, I feel ya with the bottle of wine, but we've backpacked with wine before. The hard part is I would like to give her as much as the wedding experience as possible, like cake, music, and all that jazz. I will be recording the whole thing with my GoPro, with a better mic attached of course. Trying to figure out how to get cake up there will be a hurdle.

Tricky...bake it there?

Outback Oven

Cheers,

Yea, I was thinking how I could bake a cake it my jetboil... hmmm...

There is a forum member/moderator that attended a wedding on the trail. It was phat, and he was on the coast. He did a trip report.

You can always camp at a car camp spot along the way. Then your friends can haul stuff up in a car.

There's nothing wrong with your idea of getting married while backpacking, but I really question the surprise part. Frankly, if a man did that to me I would say no, just because if he left me out of the decisions for that important milestone, I could only assume that he'd leave me out of important decisions in the future.

We talk about getting married often and she has made it perfectly clear that she does not want this big elaborate wedding. Our plan was just to elope someday. She has always said she would want to get married on top of a Mountain somewhere, and since her best friend will be joining us, I couldn't think of anyone better to marry us.

Not wanting an elaborate wedding does not mean she would not want to be involved....

True, hmm... I may have to reconsider plan of action.

Looks as though you replied before I edited my comments. Please read them again--thanks! My take on it may not be hers, but I wonder if you want to risk that?

How about a wedding in a lodge setting and then do the backpack as a honeymoon? Or a wedding in the lovely meadow at Roads End, and then backpack.

I attended a wedding on the top of Mt. Shasta years ago. They did, however, have a reception after the climb at a lodge because few family member could do the climb.

You do not have to elope to have a small wedding. Just invite a few best friends and immediate family.

You get the paperwork done from the county you reside in, and then take the papers wherever you wed, and you must have one witness in addition to the person who marries you, sign the papers when the ceremony is done. My husband and I had a 4-person wedding - the two of us, his best friend who had some weird license to marry, and his friends wife. We did it all, when the spirit struck us the day of the "wedding", at his friends house, between tasting wine, dining and visiting.