Photographer captures wrong couple's mountaintop proposal

Jacob Peters finds the mystery couple he had photographed using Facebook

An American photographer made a two hike up to Whittaker’s Point in Arkansas, to capture the moment a young man proposed to his girlfriend – little did he know the lucky couple was not who he was hired to photograph.

Jacob Peters was hired by a man from Wisconsin to photograph from afar the exact moment he asked his girlfriend to marry him.



“So a guy from Wisconsin contacted me to take photos of him proposing to his girlfriend up on hawksbill crag at sunrise. He wanted to keep it a secret from his girlfriend and surprise her with photos,” Peters wrote on his Facebook page a day later, in a bid to be find the people whose perfect moment he had captured.

[fbpost link="https://www.facebook.com/JP479/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1894080677481254"]

“I wake up at 2:30am. Start heading to Whitaker's Point. Get there at 4:45. Start hiking into the woods with ZERO light besides my cell phone flash light. After 45 minutes of hiking and not seeing any signs of the actual place I'm supposed to be I turn around. After 10 minutes of backtracking I run into some college age kids who have been there before and they tell me I was heading the right way. So I turn around and follow them. I get to my spot around 6:00 am. Set up and wait for the couple to show up.”

With no cell phone signals or any other way of contact, the photographer remained unaware that the couple he was supposed to photograph was running later. As fate would have it, another young man had a similar idea of proposing to his girlfriend of two and a half years at sunrise after a hike. So when David Le and Jenny Pham showed up at the spot, Peters assumed they were his clients.

Danny Le and Jenny Pham's moment captured by Jacob Peters. PHOTO: FACEBOOK

“It's them. I'm sure of it. A little late but still not too late. They go up onto hawksbill crag. Hang out for a few minutes and then it happens. He pulls out a ring, kneels down behind her. She turns around and starts crying and hugs him and it's obvious she said yes and all went well,” the photographer wrote.

A couple of minutes and hundreds of shots later, Peters decided to head back. “After another 1 hour hike with 30 pounds of camera gear, I finally get back to my car and head home.” Once he got home, he texted the client to congratulate and tell him that the photos were beautiful. “I’m glad it all worked out,” he wrote to the client before dozing off of exhaustion.

When Peters woke up from his nap, he was surprised by the client’s reply. “I'm confused, we never saw you and we got there a little late, are you sure it was us? I was in a blue plaid shirt…” It didn’t take long for the men to realise the goof up.

Believing in the power of internet, Peters took to the social media networking site to handover the images to their rightful owners: Le and Pham. “If anyone knows who this couple might be PLEASE tell them to reach out to me, I’ll gladly give them the photos. They were engaged on 5-6-17 at 6:17A.M. on Whitaker's Point/hawksbill crag,” he appealed.

Danny Le and Jenny Pham's moment captured by Jacob Peters. PHOTO: FACEBOOK

The internet did not disappoint, Le found the post on the same day. “Hi Jacob! I can't believe what I'm seeing! My fiancée is going nuts seeing this. She even got goose bumps over this,” Le commented.

Marveling at the coincidence, Le further added: “What's crazy is that the college kids that he mentioned passed us up driving there. It was pitch black dark, so I thought maybe we should wait a bit, thinking I would like to be alive. I saw four people get out of the car that passed me. I thought to myself, I’m sure it’s not that dangerous. So off we went. When we showed up, the four of them just happened to move to another spot. I thought to myself, wow how nice of them and what perfect timing. I set up my two GoPros and wished for the best. As we were leaving I was telling my now fiancée I wish we could have a picture from this spot [where those picture were taken from] I sat there and snapped a few shots. I asked my fiancée should I asked that couple to take it for us. I am sure it was them because that guy was the only guy we saw that was dressed in a plaid shirt and khakis. Jenny said no its okay let's just leave. And so we left. And now this comes up. Wow!”

Danny Le and Jenny Pham's moment captured by Jacob Peters. PHOTO: FACEBOOK

The lucky couple shared their excitement in an interview to BBC. "We love hiking and David was planning this special trip that he wanted to be perfect. Now I know why he was a bit stressed!" Pham said. "The view was breathtaking. He asked me to film the sunrise, which at first I thought was a bit sentimental, then I turned round and he was on one knee holding a ring. It was perfect. It felt like a movie."

David, who was unable to hire a photographer was ecstatic as well. "It was beyond what I expected. I'd tried to hire my own photographer but no one was available. I thought we'd have just our own photos."



As Peters captured their memorable moment, the couple’s camera caught him snapping photos of them. "When we looked at our photos and found out about Jacob - spotting him in the distance - I got in touch. He was really kindhearted and wouldn't take a dime off me," said David.

Pondering over the blunder, the photographer told BBC that it was no one’s fault. "I wasn't to know that I was shooting the wrong couple. I wasn't given a description. It was nobody's fault. There was no signal as the area is quite mountainous. I didn't realise until I was back home what had happened."

"This whole thing is bittersweet," he added. "On one hand I've made one couple's engagement very memorable in a good way and on the other someone didn't get anything."