REAL ENGAGEMENT: Engagement Photos with grizzly bears in Lake Louise

The Couple: James & Maleah

The Season: Spring in the mountains! Early June when the grizzly bears in Lake Louise love to eat the dandelions in the meadows

The Location: Lake Louise & Moraine Lake in Banff National Park

A Snippet About the Day: June is a great (?) time to see grizzly bears in Lake Louise… if you want to see them & from a distance of course. Wherever there’s dandelions, you’re gonna find bears… it’s pretty much bear salad. We started James & Maleah’s engagement session on the shores of Lake Louise & then we made a stop at the Great Divide to shoot in the meadow. Since there were a lot of dandelions, we went in, talked loud, clapped our hands, made a bunch of noise… all the stuff you should do to warn the bears you are there. So we figured after a few minutes of making noise & no bears we were good to go. Well, the bears must have been sleeping, because not even 10 minutes of shooting, James sees three bears pop up maybe 100 feet away from us on the curve of a hill. Holy crap! We scrambled to get to a safer spot, tried to find the keys that were tossed to the side & made it to the parking lot safely… the bears were just watching us, a little interested in what we were doing, but likely went back to nap (we didn’t stick around in the meadow to find out!). Whew! We were lucky! So after our encounter with grizzly bears in Lake Louise we headed off to Moraine Lake to end the night with all sorts of epic. All in all, a pretty great day & a memorable one to be certain!

Seeing grizzly bears in Lake Louise in Banff National Park is a pretty common thing! Want to see some other weddings & engagements where we had some issues with the local bears? Check out this Moraine Lake elopement where the bears closed down the access road making the officiant, couple & wedding planner late for the ceremony! Check out this Lake Louise elopement where the ceremony was 100 feet away from the bears with Park Rangers supervising for our safety! Take a look at this Lake Louise intimate wedding that had to find a last minute ceremony venue because the grizzly bears shut us down at their original spot! Don’t worry, the grizzly bears in Lake Louise won’t stop us from making great memories!

Thinking about planning an epic mountain elopement of your own? You need to see my 5 Tips for Planning your Dream Mountain Elopement! Also see my Guide to Eloping in the Canadian Rockies to help figure out the best place for you to get married!