A Two-Person Timber Cove Elopement, by Way of City Hall

City Hall, Then Vows on the Timber Cove Cliff

First was the City Hall stop — a few classic black-and-white photos on the grand marble staircase, Tiffany's beaded train down the steps and her bouquet resting on the bronze rail, the paperwork done before they ever reached the coast.

Then the drive north to Timber Cove. Their vows happened outside, right on the edge of the bluff, the grey Pacific stretching flat behind them under a low, overcast sky — sea-stacks offshore, dark forested headland curving away, the whole thing damp and green and enormous. Lili Freitas of Weddings of Heart stood with them, book in hand, in a long plum coat against the cold. The three of them stood as just small figures on a green shelf of land above the water, and then Daniel leaned in to kiss her, her bouquet between them and nothing but ocean beyond.

“Two people on a cliff above the Pacific, the vows said with the open water behind them.”

The Two of Them on the Sonoma Coast

With no guests to gather, the time after the ceremony was theirs alone. They walked the coastal path and stopped for portraits along the wild edge — the rolling green bluff, the ice plant going red in the winter cold, the grey Timber Cove lodge stepping down the hillside behind them with its rows of little balconies over the water.

Above these cliffs stands Beniamino Bufano's ninety-three-foot peace obelisk, The Expanding Universe, set on the point in the early sixties. Tiffany and Daniel took their portraits along that same stretch, Brian Lima working the coast with them, the water dark and the sky pale all the way out.