Seth + Aliyah’s Paliku Gardens Elopement at Kualoa Ranch
Seth and Aliyah came to Hawaii for the first time and decided to use the opportunity to get married at Paliku Gardens at Kualoa Ranch. Pretty solid first trip.
They kept their morning intimate, surrounded by their closest family, with the mountains behind them and the ocean just beyond the ceremony lawn. Afterward, we headed deeper into Kualoa Ranch for their wedding portraits at Jumanji.
They told us from the beginning that they wanted their photos to feel candid, playful, and adventurous, which ended up fitting them perfectly.
An Adventure-Loving Couple
Seth and Aliyah are genuinely adventurous people. They hike almost every weekend, love reading, play video games and board games together, and collect rocks from their travels that they tumble at home to make shiny.
Their most recent big adventure before the wedding was a multi-night backpacking trip through Big Bend National Park, where they climbed Emory Peak after a long rock scramble.
So asking them to wander around the mountains at Kualoa Ranch in wedding clothes was not exactly outside their comfort zone, thankfully for us.
Their Love Story
Seth and Aliyah both grew up in San Diego, but somehow never actually met while they were living there. They had heard about each other for years because Seth’s best friend, Jake, is also Aliyah’s cousin.
It wasn’t until they had both moved to Texas that they became friends. From there, things moved pretty quickly. They started dating in December, got engaged in July, and were married in Hawaii in October.
Their faith has also played a huge role in their relationship and was an important part of their wedding ceremony. They described their faith as the foundation that has helped shape them as a couple, and you could feel how meaningful that was throughout the morning.
Personal Details From Their Paliku Gardens Ceremony
Some of my favorite parts of this wedding were the little details that would have been easy to miss if you didn’t know the story behind them.
Aliyah had the exact coordinates of their ceremony site engraved inside Seth’s wedding ring.
So now he gets to carry a tiny piece of Paliku Gardens with him wherever they go next. Then there were the flower petals.
During the ceremony, Aliyah’s grandmother tossed petals around the couple. But these weren’t just flowers picked out for the wedding. The petals had been collected from flowers Seth had given Aliyah on their dates and saved specifically for their wedding day. Which is so sweet. Those are the kinds of wedding details I love photographing because they might only take up one small frame in the final gallery, but the story behind them is huge.
Getting Married at Paliku Gardens
Paliku Gardens is one of those wedding locations that really doesn’t need much help.
The ceremony lawn sits beneath the mountains of Kualoa Ranch, surrounded by tropical greenery, with views toward the ocean and Mokoliʻi.
It gives couples a little bit of everything without having to spend half the wedding day driving around Oahu.
For smaller weddings and elopements especially, it works beautifully because the space still feels intimate while the scenery feels huge.
Seth and Aliyah’s ceremony was relaxed and personal, which gave us plenty of time to photograph not only the traditional moments, but also all of the little reactions happening around them.
Family laughing, quiet moments during the vows, their grandmother throwing petals, and all the in-between pieces that make a wedding actually feel like their wedding.
Jumanji Wedding Photos at Kualoa Ranch
After the ceremony, we headed into Jumanji for couple portraits.
This was probably the most natural place we could have taken these two.
They wanted a mix of classic wedding photographs and candid images that felt playful and adventurous, so we kept things moving.
We had them walk through the fields, run around a little, let the wind take over Aliyah’s veil, and occasionally stop long enough for something a little more traditional.
The mountains were doing most of the work anyway.
The result was a mix of huge landscape photographs, quieter portraits, movement, little details, and plenty of moments that actually felt like Seth and Aliyah.
Planning a Kualoa Ranch Elopement on Oahu
If you’re planning an Oahu elopement at Kualoa Ranch, one of the biggest advantages is how much variety you can fit into a relatively short wedding day.
You can have an intimate ceremony at Paliku Gardens and then transition into dramatic mountain portraits without leaving the property.
If photos are especially important to you, I always recommend leaving enough room in your timeline for the portrait portion of the day.
Locations like Jumanji are worth having time to actually explore rather than rushing from one photo to the next.
The best candid wedding photos usually happen when there is enough breathing room for couples to stop thinking about the camera and just enjoy being together.
Congratulations, Seth + Aliyah
Their first trip to Hawaii ended up including a pretty memorable Saturday morning.
A ceremony beneath the mountains at Paliku Gardens, family and faith woven throughout the day, coordinates engraved into a wedding ring, flower petals saved from their dates, and a trip into Jumanji afterward.
Not a bad way to start a marriage.
Congratulations, Seth + Aliyah 🤍
Venue: Kualoa Ranch Weddings
Ceremony Location: Paliku Gardens
Portrait Location: Jumanji at Kualoa Ranch
Photography: Tone Photography Studio
