It was a surprisingly brilliant morning after some snowfall the night before in Yellowstone National Park. As I entered the north entrance and headed into the higher altitudes en route to the falls, the roads were slick with a frosty covering and the peaks had a fresh white highlight as the sun made it’s way over the ridge.
My clients arrived soon and the big surprise was about to unfold. I was in position, posed as another tourist dude with a camera. As the couple were nearing the edge of the overlook, the lady who was about to get the surprise of her life, looked right at me and held her phone out, and asked ‘say, would you mind taking some pictures of us?’. I was about to respond with ‘sure’ and started to approach them with my camera dangling from my hand, with wrist strap secure. Just then the gentleman called her back and brought her face to face with him and proceeded to take a knee. The camera phone remained in her hand and the other hand raised to her face in shock and immense joy! It was an amazingly beautiful moment as I banged away capturing all of the excitement and emotion. Truly a surprise… shock and awe proposal!
Afterwards, we had a good laugh about it as we ventured off to other places in Yellowstone. We headed south from the falls to one of the highest places in the park that you can drive to, above Yellowstone Lake, stopping here and there making some historic images, capturing the early days of a their life together.
We ended up here on the shore of Yellowstone Lake where the winds had blown ice off of the lake onto the shore line creating a 7 foot tall iceberg! It didn’t take much to get them to climb up for a cool, COLD photo!