My husband and I scored our dream mountain wedding venue for only $200. Here's a breakdown of our big day.

• My husband and I got married at Maroon Bells Amphitheatre near Aspen, Colorado, for $200.

• We stood in front of the most stunning mountain views with a close group of loved ones.

• Our reception was about an hour away, and our whole wedding ended up costing about $20,000.

Maroon Bells Amphitheatre isn't a traditional wedding venue, but we immediately knew it was the one for us.

My husband, Alex, and I live in Texas, and we'd never even been to Colorado, so we often get asked how we found the amphitheater for our ceremony. I definitely feel like it was a stroke of luck.

We knew for a while that we wanted an outdoor mountain wedding, but many of the popular Colorado venues with great views were very pricey.

As we were searching online one night, Maroon Bells Amphitheatre came up on a website listing affordable, beautiful mountain wedding locations. Once we saw it was only $200, we knew we had to do it.

Our planner described our wedding style as "woodland-bohemian," and Maroon Bells was the perfect setting.

My husband and I both love nature and wanted an intimate, chill wedding, so I really don't think we could've picked a better ceremony location.

Our wedding was a dream come true, and I wouldn't change a thing about it.

It's a popular hiking area, but the amphitheater is mostly secluded from crowds.

The parking lot is a few hundred feet from the amphitheater, connected by a paved walkway.

There are several intersecting walkways that lead to Maroon Lake and other hiking trails, but the main path up to the amphitheater is surrounded by aspen trees and curves into the pretty secluded ceremony area.

It's still visible from the main walkways, but we didn't have issues with noise from crowds. In fact, we enjoyed the well-wishes from passersby as we walked back along the main path for photos.

We had to reserve Maroon Bells a year in advance — months before we actually got engaged.

Maroon Bells' reservation website operates on a 12-month rolling basis from May to October. We had to reserve the amphitheater exactly a year in advance as spots fill up very quickly, especially in the summer.

We reserved the amphitheater on July 1, 2021, to get married on July 1, 2022.

Fun fact: We didn't even get engaged until October.

We figured even if we decided on a different venue once we officially started wedding planning, we'd only be out $200. Plus, Maroon Bells gives a partial refund if you cancel a reservation.

Figuring out guest count and transportation took some logistical planning.

The amphitheater only holds about 50 people, so we had to keep our guest list small. It wasn't too difficult because we knew we wanted a micro-wedding, which typically means under 50 guests.

But our reservation only came with five parking passes, and we had to figure out how to get everyone plus our vendors to the site 11 miles from downtown Aspen.

Our options were renting a large van, buying shuttle tickets for each guest, or buying additional parking passes and organizing carpools with family members.

Van rentals were very expensive and shuttle tickets were $16 each. But parking passes were only $10 each, so we went with that. It ended up working out great, and most people were able to drive their own cars.

We thought about bringing some decorations but decided the mountain view was the perfect backdrop.

We considered bringing an arch for the ceremony, but I think even something simple would've distracted us from the view of the gorgeous Maroon Bells mountains.

We literally showed up with just ourselves, and the photos are stunning.

Audio posed a bit of a challenge, but one of the best decisions we made was hiring a musician.

The amphitheater doesn't allow for a large sound system, but a park ranger gave us permission to use a small personal speaker for our officiant and musician to connect to.

It allowed the guests to hear the ceremony without disturbing the wildlife.

Our incredibly talented musician-turned-friend John Brewster made our ceremony even more magical.

We picked out sentimental songs that fit the mountain vibe, and his warm guitar playing and voice blended so well with the scenery — it was an unforgettable experience.

We changed our ceremony time two days before the wedding, and I'm so glad we did.

My bridesmaids and I arrived in Colorado a few days early, so we decided to visit Maroon Bells to get a feel for the layout before the wedding.

We talked to a ranger at the welcome station about the weather in Colorado, and she mentioned that it had been pouring rain consistently for several hours every afternoon. After hearing that my ceremony was scheduled for 4 p.m., she highly recommended moving it up to beat the rain.

I discussed it with my girls, and we decided it would be best to change the ceremony time to 11 a.m. They quickly got to work letting all of our guests know.

I'm so incredibly thankful I took the advice from that ranger. The weather was perfect for the ceremony and started raining just 30 minutes after it ended.

Thankfully we kept our original reception time (6 p.m.) to let the afternoon thunderstorms pass, so guests got to explore Aspen before heading to our outdoor celebration.

Aspen is pretty expensive, so most of our guests stayed in Carbondale, where our reception was located.

For our outdoor reception, we booked a beautiful Airbnb in Carbondale, Colorado, which is about 50 minutes north of Maroon Bells.

Although it was pricier than our ceremony space, the Airbnb only cost us $3,000 for three nights.

Our bridal party all stayed together, but we let our out-of-town guests choose their own accommodations.

Most opted for hotels or Airbnbs in Carbondale, which worked out great because they didn't have to travel far after the reception ended.

Because we saved so much on the ceremony space, we were able to spend more on other important aspects of our wedding.

My husband is a videographer, and I really appreciate great photography, so both of those things were very important to us when planning our wedding.

We had room in the budget to splurge more on these vendors, but we lucked out by winning an Instagram contest and getting our photographer for $1,260. Her usual rate is closer to $5,000 for a wedding like ours.

Although not as much of a discount as our photographer, our videographer also gave us a deal and shot our wedding for $5,200.

In addition to those vendors, we had our amazing wedding planner ($850), caterer ($1,500), and musician ($850). Combined with my custom-made dress ($700), furniture rentals ($1,600), and other miscellaneous travel and decor expenses, our wedding cost about $20,000 in total.

Our wedding wouldn't have been the same if we hadn't found Maroon Bells.

I'm so thankful we found Maroon Bells because most venues typically cost a few thousand dollars. If we'd been forced to pay that, we wouldn't have been able to afford our dream vendors.

Getting married in the unbelievably beautiful location is something my husband and I will never ever forget. I'm so grateful to all of the people who helped make the day extra special:

Photography: Alecca Synclair Photography

Videography: Davewoodland.co 

Wedding Planner: Lettherebeelove.com

Music: John Brewster

Caterer: Amazed by Graze

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