In case you missed the 400 photos I have posted on my Instagram feed since March, I had the most romantic and adventurous engagement shoot in California. In this post, I am going to share our experience with Carly and Elliot from A Nomadic Love and where we shot in California.
I wanted to start by saying, I am SO blown away with this opportunity and thankful we just went for it. We found cheap flights and flew to California to embark on a full road trip to take these photos. They had the full vision planned out for us and they made us feel so comfortable the entire time. I am obviously very used to taking photos, but this is probably one of Alex’s least favorite activities in life and they made it so natural and SO fun for us. I know we’ll have these photos forever, but we’ll also have the memories of giggling and smooching in the California desert. Up first is our first night in Laguna beach.
Our first night we stayed in Laguna. We walked down to “thousand steps beach” which is a true hidden gem. It was a beautiful night and we were one of like ten people down there. The little caves were so cozy and perfect for photos. My sister painted this jacket for my photos and I loved how it turned out in these shots! Alex stuck to neutrals the whole time which was my favorite decision, I am glad he wasn’t wearing busy patterns or bright colors. Carly helped me out a lot with outfits and picking the right colors, but still let me wear this fun magenta dress for the beach photos.
Up next we woke up at 5AM to drive to Anza Borrego State Park. When we were on our way to the “Slot Canyons” Elliot pulled the car over because he thought these shots would be great. We just jumped out in what we were wearing and went for it. I have a feeling I’ll be saying “we just went for it” a lot in this post, but in reality, Carly and Elliot looked up everything and had a pretty good idea how to get around the state park. One thing to realize if you’re going to shoot/travel here is you need to have a plan mapped out because each of the “good” spots are quite the drive away from each other.
Wow! The Slot Canyons were seriously incredible. I walked through them with no shoes and this dress on and we still made it just fine. This was my favorite part of shooting because we were able to just be us down in the canyon and really get to the “lovey” part of our shoot. We then drove up to “Fonts Point” and took a few daylight photos. The sun came out from the clouds so we seriously got 5 shots and then had to leave to go get lunch because the light was too bright.
Up next: Dry Lakebed. I know I have already said this, but maybe thissss was my favorite spot that we shot at. It wasn’t the prettiest background out of all of them (I mean it’s pretty hard to beat the Slots and Fonts Point) but we laughed harder here than any other place. This was the point in our day that Alex and I were most tired, but these photos are my favorite because they represent us the best. Very casual and so fun! We had the best time spinning around here. Again, we were one of the few people here, which was pretty great.
Last stop of our incredible adventure shoot was Fonts Point at sunset. We shot a few photos here, took in the view and drove our 2 hours back to our Airbnb for some Chick-Fil-A in the car and a good night of sleep.
I can’t stop staring at these photos. I can’t pick which ones to print out. I can’t stop thinking about our trip. I just simply can’t get over it and most importantly, I really can’t wait to be a Koontz. I am so thankful to Carly and Elliot for capturing our love so perfectly. These are my favorite photos to date, and I can’t even begin to fathom how well they are going to capture our wedding because THEY’RE SHOOTING OUR WEDDING!!!! You can reach out to them here and let them know I sent you! You can also find them on Instagram at @anomadiclove.
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