Vol. IX · No. 4Est. 1999 · Worldwide

The Elopement Gazette

Arman Arai’s journal of marriages made quietly
Saturday Edition●71 dispatches in print●The Destination Edition
The Shutter

Where will you marry?

Choose a country, then narrow to a city, and the front page will set itself to your dispatches.

Showing the full front page

The Front Page
More Dispatches
A couple embracing in turquoise cenote water beneath hanging jungle vines near Tulum
FeatureTulum

How to Elope in Tulum, Where the Coast Faces the Wrong Way

The sun rises out of this sea and sets behind the jungle. Once you know that, the whole day rearranges itself, and the cenotes turn out to be the reason you came.

Jungle running down to a dark sand beach on the Colombian Pacific coast with mist on the water
Feature

How to Elope in Chocó, on the Colombian Pacific

There is no road to this coast. That single fact produces everything else about it, including the reason to come.

The city of Oaxaca at dusk with the mountains of the Sierra Madre del Sur behind
FeatureOaxaca

How to Elope in Oaxaca

A Zapotec valley with a Spanish city dropped in the middle of it. The locations that work, the permissions that are not optional, and the two weeks to avoid.

A couple under the jacaranda trees on a Mexico City street in spring
PermitsMexico

Symbolic vs Legal: Marrying in Mexico

The paperwork and the ceremony are two different events. Pull them apart and the whole trip gets simpler, shorter and better.

A couple on a golden alpine ridge above a lake in Jasper National Park
FeatureJasper

How to Elope in Jasper: Dark Skies, Real Costs and the Fire

The park Banff prices you into, and the second largest dark sky preserve on earth

A couple on a fog-wrapped rocky headland on the Pacific coast of Vancouver Island
FeatureTofino

How to Elope in Tofino: The Coast, The Tides and What It Costs

A rainforest that ends at an ocean, and the tide decides half of it

A couple on bare rock high above the flooded reservoir valley at Guatapé, Colombia
FeatureColombia

The Mountains Circuit: Eloping Across Antioquia and the Coffee Axis

Medellín, Guatapé and the wax palms, joined by road rather than by a domestic flight. What the circuit costs, how the days are shaped, and why the driving is the point.

A couple walking through frailejones in cold fog on the páramo above Bogotá
FeatureBogotá

The Andes and the Páramo Circuit: Eloping Above Bogotá

A cathedral cut two hundred metres inside a salt mountain, a shrine above a city of eight million, and a high moor full of plants that grow nowhere else on earth.

A couple walking away down an empty colonial street in Cartagena at first light
FeatureColombia

The Caribbean Circuit: Eloping in Cartagena, Rosario and Barú

A five hundred year old walled city, then a forty five minute boat to coral islands. Colonial stone and open water in one long weekend, with no flight in between.

A couple standing alone on a bluff above the Strait of Georgia during their Vancouver Island elopement
DispatchVancouver

Eloping on Vancouver Island: The Day Noor and Kenji Ran Out of Road

They drove north up the east coast until the highway thinned out, and got married on a bluff above the Strait of Georgia with one officiant and nobody else. The day, and how to plan one.

A couple on a dry golden bluff above the Pacific in Baja California Sur
Dispatch

Eloping on the Baja Bluffs: The Whole Circuit

Two oceans an hour apart with a desert in between, and the most photogenic beaches are the ones you must not swim at.

A couple beside a canoe on the shore of Maligne Lake with Spirit Island behind
DispatchJasper

Can You Get Married at Maligne Lake and Spirit Island?

Yes at the lake, no on the island, and almost everybody asking the question means the island. Here is what is actually possible.

A couple on the wooden footbridge to Pyramid Island with a snowy peak behind in Jasper
DispatchJasper

Can You Get Married at Pyramid Lake in Jasper?

Yes, and it is the one I would pick for a couple who want something beautiful without turning the day into an expedition.

The Milky Way over a mountain lake in Jasper with a fire burning on the shore
FeatureJasper

Eloping Under Jasper's Dark Sky Preserve

11,228 square kilometres of protected darkness, and the one thing this park has that no other Canadian mountain town can buy.

Alpenglow on the peaks above a still lake in Jasper with a canoe at a dock
CompareJasper

Jasper Winter vs Summer Elopement: An Honest Comparison

Two different parks, and the winter one lost its centrepiece. Maligne Canyon is closed for 2026 and the icewalks are not running.

A couple walking a golden alpine ridge above a lake in Jasper National Park
PackagesJasper

Jasper Elopement Packages: What Each Tier Actually Includes

Two tiers, and the difference is time and film rather than a list of extras. The Blueprint has no film in it.

The Elopement GazettePhotographs by Arman Arai · Set in Cormorant & Jost · Printed for the betrothed