A Torrey Pines Reserve Ceremony on the La Jolla Bluffs

Getting Ready at La Jolla Cove

Cathleen sat for hair and makeup at their hotel at La Jolla Cove, a block up from the water, while the light came up over the coast. The plan for the day stayed loose on purpose: nothing rushed, nowhere to be until the afternoon. For two people who had shaped this Torrey Pines elopement around nature above everything else, a slow morning at the cove was exactly the right start.

Once the dress was on, they drove up to Torrey Pines, where the rental crew had already set the arch and chairs on the West Overlook. Cathleen met her coordinator in the parking lot for a single flower tucked into her hair, one bloom, a strand of greenery, before she and Robert slipped down the trail, away from everyone, for a first look with the reserve to themselves.

A Torrey Pines Reserve Ceremony on the West Overlook

The ceremony was on the West Overlook, a south-facing bluff that looks back toward La Jolla with nothing past the arch but open water. Twenty-one guests took their seats as a playlist played, each chair set with a little tag and a bottle of bubbles. Pastor Rey Azofeifa walked down first, then Robert with his mother, and then Cathleen came in on her father's arm to "All of Me" by John Legend.

It was short and warm and close to the edge of the coast. When the pastor pronounced them married they recessed to Natalie Cole's "This Will Be (An Everlasting Love)," and the whole small crowd stood and blew bubbles into the sea air as they passed.