the pocket guide
Eight things to work out, in the order they actually matter. Tick them off as you go.
How to elope in Queensland & Australia
how to elope
[ A complete guide to eloping in Australia ]
You know you don't want two hundred people and a seating chart. You know you'd rather be standing somewhere that means something with the person you're marrying and not much else.
What you don't know is whether it's legal, who's allowed to marry you, whether you need a permit for that headland, what your mother is going to say, and roughly a hundred other things that arrive at two in the morning.
None of it is complicated. It's just that nobody writes it down.
So here it is, written down.
You've got a folder of saved photographs and absolutely no idea what happens next
[ THE 2AM PROBLEM ]
More than that
15 or fewer
That's the line most people use, and it's as good as any. But the number isn't really the point.
The difference isn't headcount — it's whether the day is built around the two of you or around the guest list. I've photographed thirty-person days that were unmistakably elopements, and eight-person ones that felt like a wedding with most of it removed.
Legally there's no difference at all. Same paperwork, same celebrant, same two witnesses, same certificate. Nobody at Births, Deaths and Marriages counts the chairs.
So use whichever word you like. Everything on this page applies either way.
Elopement, or intimate wedding?
[ before we start ]
staying
the day
team
permits
papers
guests
where
season
start again
Tick them off as you go. Nothing here is complicated — it's just that nobody writes it down.
Eight things to work out, in the order they matter
[ THE elopement check list ]
staying
the day
team
permits
papers
guests
where
season
Pick the season first. Then find the date inside it.
Choosing a date because it's meaningful, then discovering it's the middle of the wet season.
One thing people get wrong
01
Everything else follows from this. The light, the crowds, whether the track is walkable, whether you'll be standing in a storm at four o'clock.
Winter is the secret in South East Queensland. Dry, clear, cool enough to walk in, and the light is better. Summer means afternoon storms and humidity that will find you wherever you're hiding. Spring and autumn are the safe middle.
Down south it inverts — summer is the season in Tasmania and the alps, and winter shuts a lot of it down.
Pick your season before you pick your date
the season
staying
the day
team
permits
papers
guests
where
season
NZ is home.
Somewhere neither of you has been, which turns the day into a trip.
Far
A street, a laneway, the kitchen. The places you already live in.
Ordinary
A property, an estate, a vineyard. Someone else owns the problem of chairs and toilets.
Held
No path in, no permit desk, nobody else. A summit, a gorge, a beach at the end of a track.
Wild
Picking the most photogenic spot in the state rather than one that already means something to the two of you. The second one always photographs better.
One thing people get wrong
02
Most people start with a location they've seen a photograph of. Start one step earlier — with what you want the day to feel like — and the location tends to pick itself.
Choose the kind of place before you choose the place
where
staying
the day
team
permits
papers
guests
where
season
Inviting one more person to avoid a conversation. It's never one more person.
One thing people get wrong
03
This is the step people lose sleep over, and it's almost never about logistics.
The law only asks for two witnesses. They can be friends, family, your celebrant's partner, or two strangers who happen to be on the same track. I've been one more than once.
Everything above two is a choice. The useful question isn't who would be offended — it's who you'd want standing there. Those are different lists, and the second one is usually much shorter.
Then tell people early, and tell them warmly. Most of the hurt comes from finding out afterwards, not from not being invited.
Two of you, or your favourite fifteen
guests
team
On the day
What they'll need from you
One form, and a month you can't skip
staying
the day
permits
papers
guests
where
season
Two witnesses over eighteen are required every time, however small the day, and they sign alongside you. There are three certificates. The one you take home is real, but it isn't the one Passports will accept — that comes later from the registry in the state you married in, and you order it yourself. Your celebrant lodges everything within fourteen days.
A passport each, or a birth certificate. If either of you has been married before, the divorce order or death certificate. Originals or certified copies. Only one of you needs to sign to lodge it — the other can sign any time before the ceremony.
A five-page form called a Notice of Intended Marriage has to be in your celebrant's hands one calendar month before the day. Not a registry, not a government office — the person marrying you. One month is the floor, eighteen months the ceiling, and inside that window your date can move.
Different country, different rules. Plenty of couples sign the Australian paperwork quietly at home first and let the day be the day.
One form. One month. A handful of signatures. After that the only thing left to organise is the part you actually wanted.
I've done this myself so reach out if you have any questions.
If you're marrying overseas
04
One form, and a month you can't skip
PAPERS
permits
staying
the day
team
papers
guests
where
season
Assuming somewhere that empty doesn't need asking. The emptier it looks, the more likely it belongs to a national park.
One thing people get wrong
05
This is the step that decides whether the place you're picturing is actually available on the day.
Every spot belongs to someone — a council, a national park, a farmer, a resort. Council land, from beaches to lookouts, needs a permit. It's straightforward and not expensive, but the good spots book out, so apply early. National parks are run by each state, each with its own form and its own rules, and some won't allow ceremonies at all.
Private land needs the owner's yes, in writing. A booking confirmation isn't the same thing, and plenty of holiday houses quietly ban events.
A permit buys you a window, not the place. You won't have the beach to yourselves — there'll be walkers, a dog, someone fishing down the sand — and in ten years that's the part you'll tell people about.
Someone owns the ground you'll stand on
permits
staying
the day
team
permits
papers
guests
where
season
Booking on portfolio alone. You can love someone's photographs and still not want to spend eleven hours with them on a mountain.
One thing people get wrong
06
You need far fewer people than a wedding needs, and every one of them matters more.
Start with the celebrant. Everything in the last section runs through them, and the month doesn't begin counting until they have your form in their hands. Book them before you book anything else.
After that the list is short. At a wedding your photographer is one of a hundred and twenty people. Out here they're one of three, standing close enough to hear what you say to each other, from morning until the light goes. How someone makes you feel matters at least as much as the work does.
If you're going somewhere remote, ask what they've done in that kind of place. Whether they can carry their own gear up the hill. Whether they've stood in that weather before. Enthusiasm isn't the same as having done it.
Flowers, hair and makeup are optional, and both come with a clock attached. A sunrise ceremony means someone starting on your hair at three thirty in the morning, and a bouquet that has to survive a car, a walk and the wind. Worth wanting. Just not free of consequence.
Three or four people, and one of them marries you
team
staying
the day
team
permits
papers
guests
where
season
Filling the day back up. You didn't do this to have somewhere to be at two o'clock.
One thing people get wrong
08
The ceremony is the shortest thing that happens, and almost nobody expects that.
The day is built around light, not a schedule — usually the first hour after sunrise or the last two before dark. Everything else arranges itself around that, which leaves hours that aren't spoken for. A drive with the windows down. Sitting on a rock not saying much. Lunch with your shoes off. A wedding has no room for any of it.
Eat something, carry water, and wear shoes you can walk in — the good ones go in a bag. We'll walk in slower than you think we need to, so you don't arrive out of breath.
Decide the wet-weather plan now, while it's still abstract. Somewhere covered, a second spot lower down, or simply agreeing that rain is allowed. Six in the morning with your hair already done is the worst time to make that call.
Fifteen minutes of ceremony, and a whole day around it
the day
The place is the reason you're going. It's also the thing most at risk from people doing exactly what we're about to do.
So we stay on the track. Nothing gets moved or broken for a better frame. Petals, confetti and smoke stay at home. Whatever we carry in comes out again with us, including the flowers once we're done with them.
None of it will cost you anything on the day, and you won't notice me doing it. It's just why the place is still worth standing in, and why the two people who come after you get the same view you did.
Leave it the way we found it
[ leave no trace ]
"
Somewhere in that hour it stops being an idea. They go quiet, then they get excited, then they get a bit nervous — all three of those about ten seconds apart.
Carissa
You've just read eight things to work out. Here's the part where you stop holding them.
After our first call I draft a timeline for your day and send it across with your quote. It's rough on purpose — a first go at where the light will be, how long the walk in takes, when you'd want to eat. Something to argue with. That's usually where the day starts taking its actual shape, in the back and forth over a draft neither of us is precious about.
By the week of the wedding it's the whole thing on one page, and nobody is guessing at anything.
You don't have to carry any of it on your own
AND THEN THERE'S ME
staying
the day
team
permits
papers
guests
where
season
start again
Same list, in case you've lost track. Whatever's still empty is what we'd talk about first.
How did you go?
[ THE elopement check list ]
You don't need a location, a date, or a single idea beyond the thought that you might want to do this quietly. On our first call we start sketching what your day could look like, whether you end up booking me or not.
DO YOU FEEL READY TO JUMP INTO PLANNING?
Now that you know how to elope...
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How to actually plan an elopement
elopement pocket guide
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