Sunrise Engagement Photos at Brainard Lake in the Fall

These sunrise engagement photos at Brainard Lake were so much fun! I was excited from the get go when Adrian reached out and let me know she was interested in having an experience-based engagement session before her destination wedding with Josh in the Spring of 2021. We started chatting about activities that they love doing together: hiking, cooking, being in the mountains, paddle boarding, going on picnics, etc. and decided that a sunrise engagement session at Brainard Lake with paddle boarding and a picnic was the perfect option!

I always love when people are up for waking up before the sun especially when we’re shooting at busier locations like Brainard Lake. Even though there were a few other hikers around and some campers, it felt like we had the entire place to ourselves. After we arrived at Brainard Lake and they unloaded their paddle boards we headed to the shore of the main lake to start their session just as the sun peeked up over the mountains. We found a secluded area back in the pine trees for them to set up a little picnic and snuggle together on the blanket.

They swapped in to paddle boarding clothes and we all crossed our fingers that balance would be on their side because Brainard Lake is purely snow melt so that water is chilly – and especially at 6am in September. In fact, the edges of the lake were already forming ice crystals when we had first arrived. Luckily, these two were pros at balancing and only had to momentarily dip their toes in the water to get the epic photos on their paddle board.