Jacque and Cody are marrying later this year in Denver at the Brown Palace Hotel and Spa. But first, the couple got together with us to do a Red Rocks engagement photo session over the holidays.
Jacque works for a software company in Denver, and Cody played several years of collegiate and professional baseball before settling into a sales role here in the city.
The weather was near perfect for this time of year. It was warm enough to be comfortable without heavy jackets, and there wasn’t much snow on the ground. Most of the year, it’s difficult photograph Red Rocks engagement sessions because the park is filled with concertgoers nearly every evening from the spring to the fall with concerts. The time we want to be photographing, near sunset and golden hour, is also when the park is busiest.
But in the winter, the concerts end, and we have much more flexibility to make it through the park.
Both love coming to Red Rocks for concerts, so the park was a natural place for us to capture their love for one another. We started near the 1.4-mile Trading Post Trail, which takes hikers through stunning rock formations, a meadow and valleys. We stuck to a section a few hundred feet from the Trading Post because the terrain is uneven (especially when you’re not wearing hiking shoes). But Cody and Jacque were more than accommodating for our short trek.
We then drove over to the Geologic Overlook Trail, where it’s easy to get a clear view of the Front Range and the Dakota Ridge hogback. This created the stunning backgrounds with snow-sprinkled peaks in the background of some of our photos.
Finally, we ended at the famous tunnel at Red Rocks. It’s a quintessential part of the park, and leads straight to the parking lots for those attending concerts at the amphitheater.
As the sun set and the temperatures cooled, we were fortunate to have low-lying clouds that created a radiant burst of orange and red for our final few photos.
